Allegiant canceling flights, assessing damage to Florida resort from hurricane

Allegiant Travel Co. is “assessing the damage” at its less than-construction vacation resort in southwest Florida and canceling flights as a result of Monday at an airport there, after Hurricane Ian devastated the area.

The Las Vegas-primarily based airline canceled all flights in and out of Punta Gorda Airport via Monday and “will go on to assess the situation on the ground there and make changes as needed,” spokeswoman Sonya Padgett advised the Evaluation-Journal on Friday.

“Air travel is a vital operate during a crisis such as this, so we are functioning closely with Punta Gorda Airport authorities to resume provider as quickly as probable,” she said.

Padgett also claimed the business doesn’t have “an update to provide ideal now” on its Sunseeker Vacation resort Charlotte Harbor undertaking, “as we have just started evaluating the problems and expect to know much more in the coming weeks.”

Later on on Friday, Allegiant introduced a $100,000 donation to the American Crimson Cross for hurricane relief.

Gregory Anderson, Allegiant’s president and main financial officer, said in a news launch Thursday that the firm experienced been making ready for the hurricane above the earlier quite a few days.

It gave prospects “re-accommodations at no demand, such as refunds to give them time to regulate travel strategies.” It also “repositioned aircraft out of the Florida area” and delivered options for staff, their families, and animals “to come across shelter in other bases.”

He also said the Sunseeker teams had “worked all-around the clock to aid safeguard the vacation resort.”

Sunseeker is slated to element 500 lodge rooms and more than 180 prolonged-remain suites, as properly as bars, eating places and meeting room.

It is getting developed along the Peace River in Port Charlotte, Florida. Drone video clip taken Thursday in Port Charlotte, and obtainable on The Washington Post’s website, confirmed flooded household streets and harmed properties following the hurricane hit.

The storm flooded a Port Charlotte hospital’s lower-stage emergency home, and intense winds tore section of the roof from its intense-treatment device, The Associated Push reported.

The hurricane made landfall in South Carolina on Friday, following it remaining at minimum 25 people dead in Florida, CNN reported.

Allegiant broke ground on Sunseeker in 2019, suspended building in March 2020 amid the early chaos of the pandemic, and resumed construction in summer 2021.

As of this August, Sunseeker was predicted to open up in the second quarter of 2023.

Allegiant, an extremely-reduced-price tag provider, is known for traveling from smaller, underserved towns to heat-weather conditions family vacation places, typically with out opposition on its routes.

Call Eli Segall at [email protected] or 702-383-0342. Observe @eli_segall on Twitter.