Whereas the beginning of 2025 introduced with it a lot optimism about excessive traveler numbers, the projections didn’t pan out for each airline.
By September, two Scandinavian airways — Play and Braathens Aviation — left vacationers in several elements of the world stranded after all of a sudden having to close down operations amid high-profile bankruptcies.
Earlier within the yr, Ravn Alaska, Air Belgium, and SKS Airways in Malaysia all additionally shut down operations. Bigger names similar to WizzAir and Qantas Airways shut down their branches in Abu Dhabi and Singapore.
On the finish off October, information additionally broke that constitution provider Verijet was submitting for Chapter 7 chapter. The Vero Seaside, Florida-based airline had amassed over $38.7 million in liabilities and confronted a slew of lawsuits when 60-year-old founder Richard Kane died all of a sudden from a coronary heart assault on the finish of September.
Particulars about Verijet and the place it flew
As first reported by an outlet protecting the personal jet area, the submitting was submitted within the eleventh circuit of the US Chapter Courtroom for the Southern District of Florida. Opposite to the extra widespread Chapter 11, Chapter 7 chapter signifies that the homeowners will not be seeking to restructure or requesting monetary help however will head straight into liquidation.
With a fleet of single-engine Cirrus SF50 Imaginative and prescient jets, Verijet ran short-haul flights in several areas of the U.S.
Associated: Vacationers nonetheless stranded after airline goes bankrupt, cancels flights
In 2023, the airline additionally expanded to the Bahamas and different worldwide locations just like the Dominican Republic, Turks and Caicos, and the Cayman Islands as a part of very speedy development since Kane based Verijet on the peak of the Covid pandemic in 2020.
In 2023, Verijet was recorded because the Thirteenth-largest operator of constitution and fractional flights within the nation. Its $38.7 million in liabilities included over $10.5 million owed to jet card prospects (people and firms that lease personal jet as a part of an hourly or every day price for a enterprise mannequin generally utilized by such operators), in addition to extra money owed to plane lessors, insurance coverage firms, and varied collectors.
Verijet began flying to the Bahamas and different worldwide locations in 2023.
Picture supply: Shutterstock
Monetary issues led to Verijet’s chapter
In November 2024, buyer Sam Crigman sued Verijet within the Eleventh Judicial Circuit of Miami-Dade County after buying a 50-hour jet card for $147,812 again in March.
The lawsuit claimed there have been “quite a few delays, canceled flights, and numerous excuses for Verijet’s failure to offer the flight companies.” Since Kane’s death, the carrier has not been running flights and is unlikely to run them in the future, since it’s asking a judge to go straight to liquidation.
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In April 2025, the Circuit Court of the 11th Judicial Circuit awarded another customer Brandon Kruse a default judgment of $328,000 over flights that the carrier did not provide. Similar lawsuits were also filed by several charter companies booking Verijet to run flights to their clients as well as lessors and former employees.
In a statement released in response when the court awarded Kruse the funds, Verijet said that its “jet card program doesn’t provide assured service” and that it has “taken this expertise to coronary heart and used it as a catalyst for constructive change.”
Associated: Regional airline declares chapter, prospects could not get refunds
