Avelo Airlines has chosen Wilmington Airport (ILG) as its fourth base and will launch five routes from the Delaware facility to Florida.

However, the LCC has postponed plans to open a base in Fort Myers’ Southwest Florida International (RSW).

Wilmington Airport, also known as New Castle Airport, is located five miles south of Wilmington and 26 miles from Philadelphia. The LCC’s inaugural service will depart on Feb. 1, 2023, to Orlando (MCO), operating three times per week.

Flights to Fort Lauderdale (FLL) and Tampa (TPA) will begin the following day, with Fort Myers starting on Feb. 3 and West Palm Beach (PBI) on Feb. 4. These four routes will each be offered twice a week.

Avelo will base one Boeing 737 at the airport, which becomes the fourth base in its network alongside Burbank Airport (BUR), Southern Connecticut’s Tweed-New Haven Airport (HVN) and Orlando International.

New Castle County executive Matt Meyer said: “Wilmington Airport has tremendous potential to be an economic driver in our county. We welcome Avelo to our community to provide reliable and fast service to our residents and look forward to further growth opportunities.”

Avelo’s arrival at Wilmington Airport will restore scheduled air service from the facility after Frontier Airlines ended flying to the destination in June. Frontier returned to IGL in February 2021 with a route to Orlando—almost six years after last serving Wilmington. However, it pulled the plug on flights to the city four months ago.

At the same time as announcing the Wilmington Airport base, Avelo confirmed that it has postponed previously announced plans to open a base at Fort Myers due to a “significant reduction in travel demand” resulting from Hurricane Ian.

“However, Avelo continues to operate flights between RSW and HVN and will begin operating flights between RSW and ILG in February,” the carrier said in a statement.

With the addition of ILG, Avelo will serve 32 destinations across the US.