Spirit Airlines announces two new flights to Colombia from Fort Lauderdale airport

Spirit Airlines is expanding its presence in Latin America with two new flights to Colombia coming this year.

The Miramar-based airline announced Tuesday that it will fly nonstop to Bucaramanga and Barranquilla starting in April from its hub at Fort Lauderdale-Hollywood International Airport. The routes are new for the South Florida airport.

The flights will make Spirit the U.S. carrier with the most destinations in Colombia. Spirit already flies direct to Cartagena, Medellín, Bogotá, Armenia and Cali.

The low-cost airline plans to expand its fleet by 33% in the next two years. In October, Spirit announced it signed a memorandum of understanding with aircraft manufacturer Airbus to purchase 100 new planes over the next seven years with the option to purchase an additional 50 planes.

Spirit is an all-Airbus airline, insulating the company from the crisis at competitor Boeing Co., which announced in December it would halt production of its 737 Max plane.

Taylor Dolven

Miami Herald

305-376-2052

Taylor Dolven is a business journalist who has covered the tourism industry at the Miami Herald since 2018. Her reporting has uncovered environmental violations of cruise companies, the impact of vacation rentals on affordable housing supply, safety concerns among pilots at MIA’s largest cargo airline and the hotel industry’s efforts to delay a law meant to protect workers from sexual harassment.