Allegiant acquires three former Hamburg Airways Airbus A320s

Allegiant Travel Company (Allegiant Air) (Las Vegas) has announced that it has purchased three additional Airbus A320 aircraft. The aircraft were most recently operated by Hamburg Airways in Europe and are scheduled to enter the Allegiant operating fleet in 2015.

Specially the three aircraft are N227NV (msn 714, ex D-AHHH, N228NV (msn 716, ex D-AHHD) and N229NV (msn 730, ex D-AHHG).

On the financial side, the company reported first quarter net income of $64.9 million, up 89.8 percent from the same quarter a year ago.

The CEO commented on the results:

“We are very proud to report our 49th consecutive profitable quarter, a record quarter for the company, both in absolute terms and on a percentage basis,” stated Maurice J. Gallagher, Jr., Chairman and CEO of Allegiant Travel Company. “I especially want to thank our team members for their contributions. Their everyday efforts delivering customers safely and reliably is critical to our continued success. It’s nice to start the year off with such strong results after coming off one of the most operationally challenging years in recent memory.

“I’m also pleased to announce our pilots will be receiving a pay increase as a result of our continued success. Excluding a $43.3 million non-cash impairment change in the fourth quarter of 2014, our trailing twelve month operating margin was 21.8 percent as of March 31st. As part of our pilots’ variable pay band structure, pilot pay scales will increase between 5 and 7 percent per hour effective May 1st.

Finally CEO Gallagher commented on the on-going dispute with its pilots and additional focus by the FAA:

“And lastly we have had recent labor/legal issues with the representative of our pilots, the IBT. We expect a successful outcome on our Preliminary Injunction request before the Las Vegas Federal court in the coming weeks. In conjunction with these labor activities, our local FAA office has stepped up surveillance of our operations. We are not aware of any findings from the FAA related to this increased surveillance. However, the FAA has indicated their heightened focus and surveillance associated with the labor activity will continue until the outcome of the litigation is known. While this increased surveillance is in place, the FAA has indicated it will not process any current or additional requests for work that may relate to our planned growth. At the current time, we do not expect any immediate effect on our operations.”