The best hurricane is the one that never makes landfall. There might still be severe flooding along the coast, but the worst destruction is avoided. Seemingly, a pair of pilots decided to brush the edge of a massive storm at sea. A Spirit Airlines flight flew over Hurricane Erin on Monday while it was a Category 4 storm. The Florida-based low-cost carrier stated that the plane's flight crew safely navigated above the hurricane. It's likely the passengers had no idea that the turbulence they were experiencing was a tropical cyclone with winds whipping at over 130 miles per hour.
Spirit Airlines Flight NK 2298 flew from Philadelphia to San Juan, Puerto Rico. The route took the plane down the Eastern Seaboard and through the Bermuda Triangle. The canary yellow Airbus A320 was flying at 37,000 feet as it approached the southern edge of the hurricane near the end of the four-hour flight. The altitude was reportedly high enough to avoid the worst winds from the weather system and the plane landed safely with no injuries. Spirit Airlines told USA Today:
"Safety is always our top priority. Our pilots followed procedures and Air Traffic Control (ATC) instructions while en route to San Juan (SJU). Our Operations Control Center closely tracks weather systems and works with our pilots and ATC to determine flight paths that safely navigate around or above adverse weather conditions."
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Spirit Airlines Can't Compete With Actual Hurricane Hunters
There are aircraft that are tasked with flying directly through hurricanes. They aren't operated by Spirit Airlines and you can't buy a ticket to fly on them. The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration operates a small fleet of Hurricane Hunter planes. It's exactly what it sounds like. The agency takes a plane laden with sensors and flies it through a storm to collect data for forecasters. The Lockheed WP-3D Orion, one of the models used, was originally designed to hunt submarines. The flight can be rough as the extreme turbulence rattles the plane, throwing things around the cabin.
Enduring a Hurricane Hunter flight is probably easier than dealing with Spirit's financial predicament. In a quarterly SEC filing, the airline admitted that it might not survive the next 12 months if nothing changes. Spirit lost $245.8 million over this year's second quarter, citing the low demand for leisure travel. The airline filed for bankruptcy last year in the wake of its merger with JetBlue being shot down in federal court on antitrust grounds. Spirit is still struggling to make it through a patch of rough air financially.
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