An Avelo 737 at Burbank airport Tuesday, April 26, 2022. Avelo Airlines launched one year ago ..
. [+] operating out of Hollywood Burbank Airport and is now staffed by more than 400 employees. (Photo by David Crane/MediaNews Group/Los Angeles Daily News via Getty Images) Avelo Airlines took off on its first flight on April 28, 2021.
The TSA person checking IDs for the new airline wore a mask and was stationed in a glass booth with a slot for one’s driver’s license. Yet Avelo Flight 101 had balloons and smiling flight attendants by the gate in Burbank. The airline had trained its flight attendants and other personnel in quarantine due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
(Note the masks in the photo below.) The airlines had yet to fully bounce back from the previous May, when the all-time monthly low of 180,151 flights was set. By April 2021, flights were up to 471,375, but were just 72% of the number operated in April 2019 (652,533).
Only about half of Americans had been vaccinated at that time. Perhaps not the best time to start an airline? But Avelo launched in April 2021 as, America’s first new mainline airline in nearly 15 years. And they did it with a bang, offering 11 non-stop routes starting at $19.
Three and a half years later, the idea is still the same; flights from Ontario, CA (ONT) to Charles M. Schulz – Sonoma County Airport (STS) start at $35 one-way, Burbank, CA (BUR) to Bend/Redmond Municipal Airport, Oregon (RDM), $55, etc. I was on Avelo’s festive first flight.