Mesa airport standing by Allegiant Air after scathing safety report

PHOENIX — A spokesman with a Phoenix-area airport said the facility was standing by a low-cost airline amid a scathing report about the airline’s safety.

Ryan Smith with Phoenix-Mesa Gateway Airport told KTAR News 92.3 FM that Allegiant Air had taken steps to improve its safety standards, including replacing several models of older airplanes.

Allegiant Air has been on the defensive since the CBS program “60 Minutes” reported that the airline experienced more than 100 serious mechanical incidents on flights between January 2016 and October 2017.

“The number of inflight incidents that Allegiant has had speaks volumes, it is simply unacceptable,” Alan Price, a former chief pilot for Delta Air Lines, told The Associated Press.

Allegiant’s record of breakdowns appears related partly to the age of its fleet, particularly its MD-80 planes.

Those planes are nearly 28 years old on average and require more maintenance than newer models.

But Smith said the airline had switched out its older aircrafts with the newer Airbus 319 and 320 models at Gateway Airport, which led to a “dramatic increase” in customer satisfaction and reliability.

“We were the first large base for Allegiant to switch out all the new airbuses,” he said.

While the new planes would not hold as many passengers, they would require less maintenance compared to older models and would be able to serve more destinations in a single day, Smith added.

The airline said it planned to retire all its MD-80s by the end of this year.

Records obtained by CBS through the Freedom of Information Act showed that Allegiant flights were three-and-a-half times more likely to suffer an in-flight breakdown than flights operated by American, United, Delta, JetBlue or Spirit.

The report also aired a long-running accusation by the Teamsters union local representing Allegiant pilots that the airline discourages pilots from reporting mechanical problems with planes.

It also took aim at the FAA for failing to take action against Allegiant.

Allegiant issued a statement by Eric Gust, vice president of operations, charging that the CBS story told a “false narrative” about Allegiant and the FAA.

He said the airline complies with all FAA requirements, and that any suggestion the airline muzzled employees “is offensive and defamatory.”

In a memo to employees, CEO Maurice Gallagher and other executives said they were ready “to fight back” against the network.

They said the story was based on outdated statistics — similar allegations were raised in 2016 by the Tampa Bay Times in Florida — and was prompted by a pilot who was fired after ordering an emergency evacuation in which some passengers were injured.

The pilot is now suing the airline, and one of his paid experts was featured prominently in the “60 Minutes” broadcast.

KTAR News 92.3 FM’s Jeremy Foster and The Associated Press contributed to this report. 

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