Ted Christie, CEO of Spirit Airlines, is stepping down from his role leading the embattled carrier, effective Monday, the company said. A group of several company executives — CFO Fred Cromer, COO John Bendoraitis and General Counsel Thomas Canfield — has been tapped to lead the airline until a successor is found. Christie had been president and CEO of Spirit since 2019 and saw the airline through the Covid pandemic. Spirit filed for bankruptcy protection in November after years of mounting losses, a failed merger, increased competition and more demanding consumer tastes. The budget carrier, which had reshaped the industry with its no-frills tickets, was the first major U.S. airline to file for Chapter 11 bankruptcy since 2011. Spirit last month emerged from bankruptcy protection.<br/>
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Ultra-low-cost carrier Avelo Airlines recently signed a deal with the Department of Homeland Security's Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency to carry out deportation flights under a charter agreement. “We realize this is a sensitive and complicated topic. After significant deliberations, we determined this charter flying will provide us with the stability to continue expanding our core scheduled passenger service and keep our more than 1,100 Crewmembers employed for years to come," Avelo's founder and CEO, Andrew Levy, said in a statement. The flights will be operated by three Boeing 737-800 aircraft based at Mesa Gateway Airport in Arizona and will begin on May 12. The airline plans to open a crew base at the airport to support the deportation operations and is hiring flight attendants and aircraft technicians to work and service the charters. The Trump administration has stepped up the pace and profile of deportations since the president took office in January, but the judiciary has tried to limit the executive branch's actions, with multiple federal judges ruling that the administration had overstepped its authority.<br/>
Mesa Air Group and Republic Airways agreed to merge in an all-stock deal, the companies said on Monday, in a move that would give them a larger fleet and boost efficiency in regional flying and crew management. The combined company, which would operate as Republic Airways Holdings Inc., will have a single fleet of about 310 Embraer 170/175 aircraft. Shares of Phoenix, Arizona-based Mesa, which has a market value of $29.3m, rose 23.8% in premarket trading. Terms of the merger deal, expected to close in the late third or early fourth quarter of 2025, were not disclosed. Republic shareholders would own 88% of the combined company, while Mesa’s would own a minimum of 6% and up to 12%, depending upon meeting certain pre-closing criteria. The combined company is expected to remain listed on the Nasdaq under a new ticker symbol “RJET”. The new entity’s board will have six existing directors from Republic and one independent director from Mesa’s board. Republic will continue to operate flights for American Airlines, Delta Air Lines, and United Airlines under the existing capacity purchase agreements (CPA), while Mesa will support United Airlines under a new 10-year CPA, as a result of this deal, the companies said.<br/>
WestJet is expanding its non-stop service between Calgary and Tokyo's Narita International Airport to daily year-round through the winter schedule, which begins on October 27, 2025. The airline attributes the increase of service to the continued success of the route on both sides of the Pacific, after first having increased to daily service for its 2025 summer schedule. "Leveraging our Boeing 787 Dreamliner fleet, WestJet continues to strengthen Calgary's tourism pipeline with expanded Trans-Pacific service, creating new inroads for economic growth across Western Canada and beyond," said John Weatherill, WestJet’s EVP and CCO, in a press release. "Today's announcement of our expansion to daily year-round service between Calgary and Tokyo further reaffirms our commitment to bolstering Canadians' access to Asia."<br/>
Air Baltic’s long-term chief executive, Martin Gauss, is stepping down from his post, as the Latvian carrier edges towards a planned initial public offering. Chief operations officer Pauls Calitis will temporarily take over as the head of the airline. The carrier says the supervisory board decided upon changes to the company’s management on 7 April, following a regular shareholders’ meeting. No specific reason has been given for Gauss’s leaving the position to which he was appointed nearly 14 years ago. He took over the helm of Air Baltic having previously led Hungary’s then-national airline Malev. Air Baltic supervisory board chair Andrejs Martinovs credits Gauss with steering the carrier through “significant transformation and growth” and “laying a strong foundation” for its future. The company says its operations “will not be impacted” by the management changes, and Martinovs adds that the “core objectives remain unchanged”. Air Baltic is continuing to progress towards a potential IPO.<br/>
Australian carrier Alliance Aviation has taken action to stop recurrent speed-mode selection errors by Embraer crews, after an incident in which pilots of an E190 initially failed to notice their jet was slowing as it climbed away from the Solomon Islands. The first officer, who was flying the jet from Honiara to Brisbane on 23 February last year, was not monitoring the airspeed and did not detect the deceleration, says the Australian Transport Safety Bureau. When the captain noticed the lack of acceleration, at about 134kt, they believed drag was responsible and partially retracted the flaps – from setting 4 to setting 3 – while still below minimum flap target speed. This left the aircraft with reduced lift while the airspeed continued to fall away to 131kt. The E190 has a stall-protection system which includes a low-speed ‘amber zone’ indication on the airspeed tape, with stick-shaker activation if the speed continues to drop into the ‘red zone’. It also warns the pilot with amber pitch-limit indicators on the primary flight display. Investigators state that the first officer noticed the pitch limiters, and alerted the captain, before opting to change the speed mode to ‘manual’ – only to find it was already unexpectedly set in manual mode.<br/>