Allegiant Air Travel Agency

 Few of those mechanical issues resulted in fines against Allegiant. Records by the FAA show three fines totaling $63,750 have been levied against Allegiant for unspecified maintenance issues going back to 2003. However, a proposed fourth fine of $715,000 was announced by the FAA in June, claiming that Allegiant didn’t follow proper procedure when it failed to investigate why an engine was emitting hotter-than-normal exhaust fumes.

When an MD-88 engine began overheating during a takeoff in Virginia in April 2018, the crew shut off the engine’s reverse thrust system as recommended, the FAA alleged. But rather than investigate why the engine wasn’t operating correctly, Allegiant kept using the jet for 28 flights over the next eight days. An Allegiant spokeswoman said Allegiant was following proper protocols.

Allegiant has acknowledged its past record but has taken steps to address it. The carrier was already replacing the MD-80s in 2016, and its maintenance record was starting to rebound. The carrier retired its last MD-80 in December, a year ahead of its original schedule. The last MD-80 to fly out of the Lehigh Valley was in November, said Tom Stoudt, executive director of the Lehigh-Northampton Airport Authority.

Allegiant's fleet is now made up of Airbus A319, shown here, and A320 planes, according to the company.

Allegiant's fleet is now made up of Airbus A319, shown here, and A320 planes, according to the company. (Courtesy photo)

The average Allegiant jet is now 13 years old, and its fleet is entirely made up of Airbus A319s and A320s, said Hilarie Grey, Allegiant’s managing director of corporate communications. The shift to Airbus has been a boon to the company across the board, she said. The fleet is hooked up to an Airbus cloud-based system that allows Allegiant to more easily analyze aircraft, predict when parts will need to be replaced and schedule maintenance.

Using just the Airbus models "has helped us realize efficiencies across all aspects of our system, including maintenance — from a training standpoint to how we stock parts, to daily maintenance checks and procedures which are now standardized across our system,” Grey said.

Starting in early 2020, Allegiant will have two Airbuses stationed at LVIA, and the carrier will create 66 jobs for its aircraft base. Of those, 11 will be maintenance personnel who will follow those updated maintenance policies, Grey said. Those maintenance personnel will be Allegiant employees, not hired contractors, she said.

Leocha, the consumer advocate, said the rate of Allegiant’s mechanical issues fell in line with its larger competitors by 2017. Even before then, Allegiant’s mechanical issues were never as bad as reports made them out to be, he said. While the Tampa Bay Times focused on the 11 biggest airlines, there are 17 airlines that carry at least 0.5% of America’s air travelers, he said. Allegiant’s maintenance held up better when compared with some of the smaller carriers, he said.

This April 17, 2018, photo provided by Marty Martinez shows the window that was shattered after a jet engine of a Southwest Airlines airplane blew out at altitude, resulting in the death of a woman who was nearly sucked from the window during the flight of the Boeing 737 bound from New York to Dallas with 149 people aboard, shown after it made an emergency landing in Philadelphia.

This April 17, 2018, photo provided by Marty Martinez shows the window that was shattered after a jet engine of a Southwest Airlines airplane blew out at altitude, resulting in the death of a woman who was nearly sucked from the window during the flight of the Boeing 737 bound from New York to Dallas with 149 people aboard, shown after it made an emergency landing in Philadelphia. (Marty Martinez / AP file photo)

Even those past concerns, Leocha said, should be viewed in the context of what he called the remarkably safe U.S. airline industry as a whole. American carriers have carried billions of passengers over the last 10 years with just a single fatality. That death occurred in 2018 above Berks County when a fan blade broke off a Southwest Airlines engine, shattering a window and partially sucking a woman out of the jet.

Southwest, he noted, is regarded as having one of the best maintenance records among airlines. The Tampa Bay Times’ 2016 series backed that up — it had the lowest rate of diversions due to maintenance issues.

“I 100% believe the American safety system is excellent,” Leocha said.

At no point during the maintenance controversy did officials with the Lehigh-Northampton Airport Authority lose faith in Allegiant, Stoudt said.

Over the last four years, the carrier has increased service at the Hanover Township, Lehigh County, facility, offering new routes to Nashville, Tennessee, and Savannah, Georgia, and increasing service to existing destinations such as Orlando, Florida. Along with making LVIA an aircraft base, Allegiant has partnered with the airport on other projects, including its Wings For All program, which allows passengers on the autism spectrum to practice going through security and boarding a plane.

“Allegiant has been a fantastic partner,” he said. “From our perspective, we have had only very positive experiences with the carrier.”

He and Colin Riccobon, the authority’s spokesman, said that if passengers have any concerns, they haven’t shown them. The airport hasn’t received any complaints of maintenance problems of Allegiant flights from passengers, Stoudt said. Allegiant’s passenger numbers jumped 68% from July 2016 to July 2019, and the budget carrier now handles 43.7% of the airport’s passenger traffic.

“You can base [the passengers’] consensus on the travel numbers,” Riccobon said. “There’s obviously confidence in the carrier.”

Allegiant Air

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