Avelo Airlines Drops All Flights on Tuesdays in July and August

Avelo Airlines, a small but profitable airline focusing on low-fare flights from secondary airports, plans to run no flights on Tuesdays in July and August — 2 months when travel demand is high.

This is a highly unusual decision. Let’s look at what we know about Avelo’s surprising move.

Why Is Avelo Ending Tuesday Flights in the Peak Travel Season?

July and August are peak summer travel months — months when people in the Northern Hemisphere take advantage of school closures to fly to vacation spots. Airlines based in the U.S. tend to add flights in summer to meet that demand. But that’s not what’s happening at Avelo Airlines, an up-and-coming, ultra-low-cost carrier that’s expanding fast, especially in Connecticut.

According to an analysis published by Simple Flying, Avelo is doing something drastic and ending all flights on Tuesdays in July and August. In May, June, and September, it’s running Tuesday flights, but only very few. The Simple Flying analysis found the airline has only 6 round-trip services on Tuesdays in those months.

While it’s true that Tuesdays are normally the lowest-traffic days of the week in air travel, ending all flights on Tuesdays is unheard of — particularly in summer.

Avelo began flying in 2021, concentrating on smaller airports. It flies only Boeing 737s, both the 737-700 and 737-800 models, in an economy-only, high-density layout.

Avelo isn’t cutting destinations or the size of its fleet, and it’s not laying off employees. It’s still serving more than 50 destinations in the U.S. and the Bahamas, Dominican Republic, Jamaica, and Mexico.

“We’ve always had very limited flights on Tuesdays,” an Avelo spokesperson emailed when we asked for clarification, “this is nothing new for us.” In fact, the airline said it might add some Tuesday flights in the coming weeks, although it won’t be a lot because it’s a very light travel day.

Keeping planes on the ground on Tuesdays would preserve cash, by not burning fuel or incurring the other expenses needed to fly airplanes on days where not a lot of passengers are buying tickets.

The airline’s fleet of 20 planes is entirely leased, and while airplanes on the ground do not earn money, it’s also likely that lease rates on the 737s Avelo flies — ranging in age from 13 to 21 years old, according to fleet-tracking site Planespotters — are relatively low.

Avelo has also recently agreed to run deportation flights for U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE). While this decision sparked controversy and even calls for a boycott, Avelo said it also ran those flights under the Biden administration. In any case, Avelo plans to devote 3 airplanes to ICE flights, leaving 17 available for scheduled services. The airline would have enough planes left to fly Tuesday schedules if it wanted to resume flying that day.

Final Thoughts

Avelo’s surprising decision to end all Tuesday flying in peak summer is tied, according to the airline, to very light demand. Tuesday flying may not come back in force for Avelo, either. Other airlines, after all, are predicting slower growth in 2025, due to economic uncertainty brought about by tariffs and enormous cuts to government services.