Spirit Airlines was the budget-friendly carrier America loved to hate. But now that it’s out of business, a viral crowdfunding campaign is attempting to resurrect the bankrupt airline.

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Once Hunter Peterson heard Spirit would close on May 2 — after attempts to merge with other airlines or get a lifeline from the federal government — the 22-year-old voice actor and content creator posted on social media that day with an idea to revive the airline.

If a fifth of Americans each pitched in $45, (the equivalent of a cheap Spirit flight) “we could buy Spirit Airlines,” he said.

His initial pitch was to run the airline like the Green Bay Packers, the only publicly owned team in the NFL. It has more than 5 million shares split among more than 530,000 owners. His joke, however, became a call to action. Peterson is not taking actual cash, but he has rallied $337 million in pledges from more than 370,000 verified people, his website says.

Peterson did not respond to a request for comment and said he’s not talking to media until his plans are firmer. But he said on social media that he is actively consulting lawyers as he learns the regulatory limits to his idea.

Public interest in this crowdfunding effort shows a collective desire to disrupt the airline industry. While spirits are high about the idea, experts say the regulatory hurdles alone could slow momentum to a screeching halt.

“An airline is a very complicated financial enterprise. There’s a lot of players,” said Charles Elson, a retired professor of finance at the University of Delaware.

Elson said that crowdfunding can work for small operations without much regulatory involvement, but an airline just has too many moving parts.

“You’ve got the lenders, the planes, the governmental entities that lease the space to the airline and the different facilities, the aircraft itself, liens on the aircraft,” Elson said. “Obviously union contracts with your pilots, stewardesses, your flight attendants, ground personnel, maintenance personnel.”

“It’s a nice idea,” he added. “I would be shocked if it ever became a reality. I think it’s like going to Mars.”

Columbia University law professor John Coffee Jr. also cited the time-consuming and expensive process of registering an airline as a publicly traded entity with the Securities and Exchange Commission.

There are exemptions to SEC regulations for crowdfunded companies, but that maxes out at $5 million per year, according to the SEC, which Coffee pointed out isn’t nearly enough to buy an airline.

Another option to avoid SEC registration complications is a “private placement” offering. The most common versions of this allow for an unlimited amount of money to be raised within a year. But Coffee said these are exclusive to individuals with a net worth of at least $1 million. “If you’re talking about reaching the average citizen,” he added, “they don’t have a million-dollar net worth.”

Coffee said Spirit’s bankruptcy adds another layer of complications.

“This is not a simple, clean offering,” he said. “You’re dealing with a very risky company that has essentially failed, and all those risks have to be explained.”

Spirit Airlines had been bleeding money for years, according to its 2025 bankruptcy filings. The airline had two failed merger attempts, with Frontier in 2022 and JetBlue in 2024, and filed for bankruptcy twice, in 2024 and 2025. By August 2025, Spirit had accumulated around $8.1 billion in debt.

Rising oil prices with no end in sight due to the war with Iran didn’t help either. Marshall Huebner, an attorney for Spirit during a last-minute bankruptcy hearing on Tuesday, said the price “megaspike” would have drained hundreds of millions of dollars of the airline’s liquidity.

“We just kind of ran out of runway,” CEO Dave Davis, told CNBC on Monday.

Most airlines aren’t making a profit solely from flight ticket sales — branded credit cards and frequent-flyer programs are what put them over the top. Delta, American, United and Southwest generated $200 billion in revenue in 2024. Even though all four airlines were profitable that year, they lost money flying passengers.

Spirit 2.0 would need more than ticket sales alone to be profitable. But participation in the Spirit 2.0 campaign may be about more than investing. Since the campaign started, the website has crashed multiple times due to high traffic.

“I pledged. Why not?” said Abigail Hartman, a radiologic technologist from Indiana. “I just want to be part of something from the start, you know?”

“If this works, doesn’t that prove we can do anything?” Hartman said on social media. “We can make a difference.”

On Monday, Peterson said one firm that specializes in aviation mergers and acquisitions told him his plan was “doable.” “We don’t have a ton of time,” Peterson said on social media. He added that he has heard from angel investors who would help get this plan off the ground through a legal fund, but the clock is ticking: An auction for some of the company’s assets is coming in days.

“I can’t take any money from anyone but I can take on angel investment from high-net-worth individuals,” he added. “So Mark Cuban? What’s up, man? Get in my DMs right now.”

So what does the future look like for Peterson? In a way, his quest began last year when he traveled with Spirit for 24 hours straight for a YouTube video. Now he’s trying to buy the company.

On Friday, he said on social media that he secured a legal fund to put together a bid for Spirit Airlines. He also has the backing of Spirit’s 5,500-member flight attendant union.

Should the Spirit 2.0 collective succeed in buying the airline, decisions on routes, leadership and strategic direction would be made by members, according to Peterson’s website.

Still, Peterson said he’s unsure of what’s to come. “There’s no guarantee that any of this is going to work,” Peterson said.

“We’re giving it our very best shot. But we are now one step closer to all of us owning Spirit 2.0.”

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