Allegiant Flights at St. Cloud Airport Popular in 2015

ST. CLOUD -- St. Cloud Regional Airport posted good passenger numbers in 2015.  A total of 31,113 commercial passengers flew in to, or out of St. Cloud on Allegiant Airlines last year.

Airport Director Bill Towle says the Allegiant flights between St. Cloud and Mesa, Arizona had an average "load factor" of just over 90%. That's the target number of average passengers for airlines to operate successfully.

Allegiant is currently the only scheduled service out of St. Cloud, but Towle says those flights are very popular. However, a shortage of pilots has forced Allegiant to suspend the flights to Orlando, Florida again this year.  Towle says Allegiant hasn't canceled the Orlando service, just suspended it until they can properly staff those flights.

Despite the pilot shortages, Towle says they continue trying to add vacation destination flights to places like Las Vegas and New Orleans.

Passengers were able to take daily flights between St. Cloud and Chicago in January and February of last year before those flights were cancelled due to revenue shortages. Towle says talks of resuming those Chicago flights have been pushed back while they try to grow their vacation destination options.