Louis Armstrong New Orleans International Airport - Post-Katrina Capacity Restoration

Post-Katrina Capacity Restoration

MSY reopened to commercial flights on September 13, 2005, with four flights operated by Delta Air Lines to Atlanta and a Northwest Airlines flight to Memphis. Slowly, service from other carriers began to resume, with limited service offered by Southwest Airlines, Continental Airlines, and American Airlines.

Eventually, all carriers announced their return to MSY, with the exception of America West Airlines (which merged into US Airways two weeks later) and international carrier TACA. In early 2006, Continental Airlines became the first airline to return to pre-Katrina flight frequency levels, and in September 2006, to pre-Katrina seat capacity levels.

MSY served 8,153,511 passengers in 2010, or 83.8% of the pre-Katrina high of 9,733,179 passengers in 2004, as well as the all-time high of 9.9 million passengers who used the airfield in 2000.

In May 2010, AirTran announced new daily nonstop service to its hub in Milwaukee utilizing Boeing 717 aircraft and beginning on October 7, 2010. This route marked MSY's first all-new city addition since 1998.

In November 2010, United announced resumption of daily nonstop service to San Francisco, the largest pre-Katrina domestic market that had yet to resume service to New Orleans.

On July 16, 2012, Spirit Airlines announced nonstop service from Dallas-Fort Worth to New Orleans, commencing in January 2013. Spirit became the first all-new domestic carrier, and second all-new carrier overall (after WestJet) to announce service to MSY, since 1998.