Want to fly to Florida from Youngstown this month? Now you can

VIENNA

The Youngstown-Warren Regional Airport is flying high as business has improved enough to provide year-round travel to Florida.

The airport recently worked out a deal with its primary carrier, Allegiant Air, to forgo the eight-week hiatus from August through October for flights to Orlando-Sanford International Airport.

“We finally convinced Allegiant ... that putting Orlando on hiatus for eight weeks was ridiculous,” said Dan Dickten, the airport’s executive director of aviation.

Jessica Wheeler, a spokeswoman at Nevada-based Allegiant, said there was enough demand and aircraft availability at Youngstown-Warren to continue year-round trips to Orlando.

There were 94,212 passengers in 2013. That number already was exceeded in August with 94,470.

Dickten said the airport is on course for an estimated 130,000 passengers this year. Those numbers haven’t been this high since 1998, he said.

Read more about the airport's progress in Friday's Vindicator or on Vindy.com.