Sun Country Cutting Direct Flights from Minnesota to These Five Cities
After adding new routes and direct flights over the past couple of years, Sun Country Airlines quietly announced it was cutting service from Minnesota to five cities starting next year.
We often claim Delta Air Lines as a Minnesota airline, seeing its hub at the Minneapolis-St. Paul International Airport (MSP) is the second-largest in the country. But when it comes to airlines actually headquartered here in the Land of 10,000 Lakes, that award would have to go to Sun Country Airlines. And they just made a quiet announcement regarding service to five cities starting in 2025.
Sun Country has been a household name here in the North Star State for quite a while. Industry site, Simple Flying, notes that Sun Country was founded 42 years ago, back in 1982, and started offering flights the next year, in 1983. Many of those first flights were from the Twin Cities to Las Vegas, before Vegas was the huge tourist mecca it is today.
Sun Country has gone through several different owners over the years, and even suspended its operations in 2001, after the travel slowdown in the wake of the 9/11 terrorist attacks. It resumed flying two years later, in 2003, and transitioned to its current low-cost carrier mode it is today back in 2017.
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Cutting direct flights and routes is the opposite announcement that Sun Country has been making recently. In fact, it was just last fall that Sun Country announced it was *adding* direct flights to ten new destinations from MSP this year:
- Trudeau International Airport (YUL), Montréal, Canada
- Pearson International Airport (YYZ), Toronto, Canada
- Albuquerque International Sunport (ABQ), New Mexico
- Billings Logan International Airport (BIL), Montana
- Boise Airport (BOI), Idaho
- Dulles International Airport (IAD), Virginia/Washington, D.C.
- Gerald R. Ford International Airport (GRR), Grand Rapids, Michigan
- Missoula Montana Airport (MSO), Montana
- Oakland International Airport (OAK), California
- Syracuse Hancock International Airport (SYR), New York
But heading into 2025, it appears Sun Country is starting to pull back a bit. Aviation industry site, Ishrion Aviation, noticed that when Sun Country published its extended schedule through September 2025, service to five different cities wasn't listed-- meaning the airline would likely be cutting its routes from MSP to the following places:
- Ashville, North Carolina
- Billings, Montana
- Cleveland, Ohio
- Colorado Springs, Colorado
- Omaha, Nebraska
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It also noted that these are the same cities where Sun Country was going head-to-head against Delta Air Lines. But these cuts may not be permanent, however. According to a Thrifty Traveler story from August, Sun Country said, "Even those cities cut would come back by the summer of 2026," CEO Jude Bricker said in the Thrifty Traveler story.
