US Gas Prices & Spirit Airlines Status — State-by-State Tracker

The United States is on Day 61 of the Spirit Airlines wind-down, which is the most visible operational consequence of the global jet fuel cost spike in any major economy. Spirit ceased operations at 3:00 AM ET on Saturday, May 2, 2026, after a Trump administration $500 million bailout proposal failed the previous day when bondholders rejected a 90% government stake exchange. The US Bankruptcy Court (Judge Sean Lane) approved expedited liquidation proceedings on May 5. Approximately 1.8 million May seats were cancelled, 17,000 jobs lost, and 190 aircraft are being sold off.

The proximate trigger was simple math. Spirit's 2026 restructuring plan had assumed jet fuel at $2.24 per gallon; actual fuel averaged $4.53 per gallon at the early-May peak (per Spirit's own attorney before the Bankruptcy Court) — adding approximately $360 million in unbudgeted Q1 cost on top of an existing second Chapter 11 bankruptcy. Spirit was the 8th-largest US carrier with a 3.9% market share. Its ultra-low-cost margin model could not absorb the pass-through; hedged carriers (Jet2 87%, Lufthansa Group 80% for 2026) survive while distressed and unhedged operators collapse first.

JetBlue announced 11 new routes from Fort Lauderdale on May 4–5, of which 6 are entirely new destinations. Routes go live July 9 — leaving an approximately 2-month peak-summer gap during which Spirit's roughly 1.7 million monthly passengers must be absorbed at higher fares. JetBlue's FLL operations will be 75% above last summer at approximately 130 daily departures. Frontier added 9 new routes and 15 daily flights across 18 former Spirit markets. United, American, Delta, Southwest, JetBlue and Frontier are all capping rescue rebooks at approximately $200 per passenger under coordination by Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy.

On retail fuel, the AAA national average has fallen to $3.86/gal (Jun 29) as the war premium has fully unwound: Brent closed Tuesday Jun 30 at approximately $73, capping a second quarter that recorded its worst quarterly decline since 2020 — Brent and WTI both down roughly 30% on the quarter. The structural contradiction of early July: crude prices are collapsing on the Hormuz reopening even as US domestic buffers sit at multi-decade lows — the Strategic Petroleum Reserve fell to 325.7 million barrels for the week ending June 26 (down 5.5 Mbbl on the week), a level not seen since the early 1980s and now below even the 2023 Biden-administration drawdown low; commercial crude (excluding SPR) fell to roughly 406.0 million barrels the same week, an API-estimated 11-week cumulative draw of about 59.4 million barrels. Geographically: California, Hawaii, Washington remain the highest-cost states; Oklahoma, Mississippi, Louisiana the cheapest. The US is structurally insulated from physical supply problems — the Gulf Coast refining cluster (Texas, Louisiana, Mississippi) is a net exporter of refined products — but tracks global wholesale benchmarks, and the price relief has been real even if domestic inventories have not rebuilt alongside it.

AAA-tracked average retail gasoline prices, late June 2026. State-level variation reflects state fuel taxes, regional refining geography, and (in California) the unique CARBOB gasoline blend specification.

The fundamental question for the next several months of US aviation is hedging position. Carriers that locked in fuel prices before February 28 are absorbing the cost spike at margin level; carriers that did not are facing existential pressure.

Legacy carriers (American, Delta, United) are typically 30–50% hedged for 2026. They absorbed fuel surcharges at margin level through the spring without major schedule disruption, and the pressure has since eased materially: IATA's Jet Fuel Monitor shows the global benchmark down to $119.17/bbl for the week ending Jun 20 (-14.2% w/w), well off the ~$181/bbl late-April peak. Their hubs — ATL (Delta), DFW (American), ORD (United) — continue operating to schedule, and the spring's $300+ per-sector long-haul surcharge increases are being rolled back on new bookings as the war premium unwinds. These remain the carriers most likely to absorb Spirit's market share over the next 12 months.

Southwest historically operated one of the largest hedging books in commercial aviation, although its hedge cover for 2026 is reduced from peak years. It is participating in the DOT-coordinated rescue-fare cap and absorbing former Spirit passengers without route reductions. The unique point-to-point network structure is well-suited to absorbing displaced ultra-low-cost passengers.

JetBlue exited financial fuel hedging in December 2024 — it has no protection against current fuel costs. Q1 adjusted loss of $0.87 per share; FY26 guidance suspended. Despite the financial position JetBlue is taking on substantial new capacity at Fort Lauderdale to absorb Spirit's network, with 11 new FLL routes going live July 9 and FLL operations 75% above last summer.

Frontier (ULCC) has suspended FY26 guidance and disclosed $45–50 million of unbudgeted Q1 fuel cost. Has added 9 routes and 15 daily flights across 18 former Spirit markets. Allegiant is cutting Q2 available seat miles by 6.5% year-over-year and is the most likely next carrier on the watchlist if the fuel-cost environment persists.

Norse Atlantic permanently withdrew its LAX–Europe service (London Gatwick, Paris, Rome) for summer 2026 in mid-April, citing "unpredictable fuel supply and pricing environment." This is the first major transatlantic route loss of the cycle from a US airport.

The proximate cause of every energy-flow story in 2026 is the closure of the Strait of Hormuz, the narrow waterway between Iran and Oman through which approximately 20% of global oil and a similarly material share of refined-product trade historically transits. The strait has been effectively closed since February 28, 2026. Per the IEA's May 2026 Oil Market Report, cumulative global supply losses since February exceed one billion barrels.

The United States is structurally one of the best-insulated advanced economies. The US Gulf Coast refining cluster — concentrated in Texas, Louisiana, and Mississippi — has the largest concentrated refining capacity in the world and produces more refined products than the country consumes. The US is a net exporter of gasoline, diesel and jet fuel. This is why there is no retail fuel-availability problem in the US even as Europe and the Asia-Pacific see physical supply tightening.

The exposure that remains is to price, set on global markets. Even though US refineries produce most of the fuel Americans consume, the wholesale price at which they sell that fuel tracks global benchmarks because US refiners can choose to export to higher-priced markets. When global jet fuel prices double, US airlines pay near-global prices even if the fuel was refined in Beaumont or Baton Rouge. The Platts Global Jet Fuel Index is up more than 70% since February 28; that increase is what triggered the Spirit collapse and is squeezing every unhedged US carrier.

The political dimension is real. Crude prices spent March through early June in a volatile band mostly above $90/barrel (Brent), driven by a cycle of kinetic exchanges and diplomatic openings between the US, Israel and Iran — briefly testing $100+ several times before easing. The decisive turn came with the June 17 Islamabad Memorandum (signed by Trump and Iranian President Pezeshkian), under which the US lifted its naval blockade of Iranian ports June 18 and commercial tankers resumed transiting the Omani/Iranian coastal routes. Brent fell toward and through the pre-war $72.48 baseline by late June, with a brief bounce after a weekend of renewed strikes (Jun 25-28: an Iranian drone hit the tanker M/T Kiku, US strikes on Iranian sites, Iran struck US bases in Kuwait and Bahrain) before both sides stood down. Doha technical talks Jun 30 produced no direct US-Iran meeting but did establish a joint military coordination center and saw physical transit strengthen further — Windward counted 42 Hormuz transits Sunday Jun 28, including a five-vessel southern-corridor convoy. Brent closed Tuesday Jun 30 at approximately $73, capping a second quarter that recorded its worst quarterly decline since 2020 — both Brent and WTI down roughly 30% on the quarter. The AAA national average sits at $3.86 per gallon (Jun 29), down from the $4.55 May 21 peak but still about 30% above the $2.98 pre-conflict baseline. The Strategic Petroleum Reserve has continued drawing even as prices fell — down to 325.7 million barrels for the week ending June 26 (a level not seen since the early 1980s, now below even the 2023 Biden-era drawdown low), with commercial crude (excluding SPR) at roughly 406.0 million barrels the same week. The SPR's structural role is for genuine supply emergencies rather than price management, but the sustained drawdown even as global benchmarks collapse is the defining contradiction of the US energy picture heading into July: falling pump prices sitting on top of the thinnest domestic buffer in more than four decades.

If you had a Spirit Airlines booking, you should already have received re-protection guidance from Spirit's bankruptcy administrator. If not, contact United, American, Delta, Southwest, JetBlue or Frontier directly and reference the DOT-coordinated rescue-fare cap of approximately $200 per ticket. Save your original Spirit booking confirmation. If your original Spirit flight was on a route now served by JetBlue from Fort Lauderdale, the replacement service begins July 9.

If you are driving long distances this summer, route planning matters more than it has in any recent year. State-level price variation is approximately $2.20 per gallon between California and Oklahoma — on a 1,000-mile road trip in a 25-mpg vehicle, the difference is roughly $88 in fuel cost. GasBuddy and AAA Fuel Prices show station-level pricing and allow route comparison; price variation of 50 cents per gallon within a single metro area is common.

If you are travelling to Europe, the UK and France are the highest-risk destinations for jet-fuel-supply tightening. Goldman Sachs has identified the UK as the European country most at risk of jet fuel rationing this summer. Check your airline's hedging position before booking — Jet2 (87% hedged) and easyJet (70% hedged) have the strongest no-surcharge commitments; American carrier transatlantic routes are mostly running but with $300+ per-sector fuel-surcharge increases on new bookings.

If you are travelling to Canada or Australia, both have material aviation disruption — Air Canada has suspended roughly 14 transborder/international routes year-to-date including Toronto–JFK, Montréal–JFK and, added Jun 23, Toronto–Salt Lake City (suspended from Jun 30, not expected back until 2027); Cuba flights have been suspended indefinitely since Jun 5. Qantas has suspended Adelaide–Mount Gambier indefinitely with 3.6% domestic capacity cuts. Check the destination country's specific situation: Canada · Australia · United Kingdom.

If you are concerned about Caribbean travel, Cuba is in the most acute energy crisis in its modern history (22-hour daily blackouts). US-Cuba direct flights are limited by sanctions but charter routes still operate; the on-the-ground experience is materially degraded. Alternative Caribbean destinations (Dominican Republic, Jamaica, Puerto Rico) are not experiencing the same supply collapse.