FLAGSTAFF, Ariz. — United Airlines will be discontinuing flights to the Flagstaff Pulliam Airport by the end of October.
The city announced Tuesday that the airline has chosen to stop flying planes between Denver and Flagstaff. The airline had been providing up to three flights out of Flagstaff each day, according to the airport's website.
“We are disappointed to hear that United Airlines has plans to suspend service in and out of Flagstaff,” said Barney Helmick, director of the Flagstaff airport.
Disruptions in the airline industry appear to have caused service reductions nationwide, Helmick added, despite many United flights out of Flagstaff being 90% full.
"The load percentages are incredible, but we can’t control pilot, crew, plane shortages, or on-time issues that are happening nationwide,” said interim Deputy City Manager Heidi Hansen.
The Flagstaff airport recorded processing at least 105,000 passengers in the last year.
American Airlines is continuing to offer daily service from Flagstaff to Phoenix and Dallas, city officials said.
The country's airlines continue to feel the ramifications caused by the early days of the COVID-19 pandemic, which grounded most flights and forced airlines to reduce staffing.
Airlines could almost surely be carrying more passengers if they had enough staffing. Many U.S. airlines have trimmed their summer schedules after bad weather, air-traffic delays and a lack of enough employees caused widespread cancellations over the Memorial Day weekend.
Airlines paid thousands of workers to quit during the early days of the pandemic, when air travel plummeted and airline revenue dried up. They have been hiring recently, but it takes time to train pilots, who are in particularly short supply.
Now airlines competing for key employees are offering double-digit raises to pilots, who find themselves with leverage in negotiations over new contracts.
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