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By Chris Isidore, CNN

(CNN) — Jet fuel prices nearly doubled. Airlines cut flights. Travelers were still buying tickets.

That was already a pretty good recipe for higher airfares.

And then, Spirit Airlines went out of business.

Passengers were already paying more to fly – even before the industry lost the budget airline famous for pushing fares lower.

This was shaping up to be a very expensive summer to fly. Spirit’s demise will probably accelerate that trend.

A perfect storm

US airfares were already up sharply the week before the discount airline shut down, travel booking site Kayak and investment firm Raymond James reported.

The conditions were perfect for airlines to raise fares – bad news for bargain-seeking travelers.

Here’s why:

Jet fuel: Jet fuel prices are up 84% from January, according to Airlines for America, the US industry’s trade group, adding to costs. The International Energy Administration warned that jet fuel shortages could become a reality in a couple of weeks in Europe, which gets most of its jet fuel from the Middle East. Asia could face the same problem, because it uses Middle Eastern oil to create jet fuel at its refineries.

American refiners ship jet fuel overseas, pushing US prices higher, too.

Cut flights: That led many airlines to cut their schedules. They eliminated flights that were only narrowly profitable when fuel was cheaper – flights that are now unprofitable to fly.

Those flights, on less attractive travel days midweek or Saturday, or a less popular time of day to travel, often had the cheapest seats available for travelers.

Aviation analytics firm Cirium forecasts that in just the last week, global airlines have cut planned seat offerings by 3.6% during the June 1 to September 30 period.

“When flights get canceled, we do see prices can spike quickly due to a surge in demand, especially on the affected routes,” said Kayla DeLoache, spokesperson for Kayak.

Strong demand: Airlines have reported strong bookings for the upcoming summer travel season. Several reported record revenues.

Higher fares: Kayak’s data shows the average domestic fare now stands at $365, up $30, or 9%, from the reading on March 23, just before the war in Iran sent jet fuel prices climbing. Fares are up $70, or 24% from this time last year.

Fares are also jumping higher week to week. Raymond James reports that as of April 27, the average fare for flights within the next week costs 9% more than the week before. For flights at least four weeks in the future, typically used by leisure travelers, are 7% more expensive.

Spirit goes bust

The closure of Spirit early Saturday morning could move fares even higher.

Spirit, with its no frills base fares, often provided the lowest fares in the markets it served, and forced other major airlines to offer a certain number of similarly bare-bones seats to compete.

Spirit’s flights would have provided about 2% of the seats available for travel this summer, but in some markets, including Fort Lauderdale in Florida, Detroit and Las Vegas, it offered a much greater share of available seats.

As its passengers seek other flights, there will be fewer overall seats available, creating a

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By Christopher Lamb, Jennifer Hansler, CNN

(CNN) — US Secretary of State Marco Rubio will sit down with Pope Leo XIV on Thursday amid a historic period of tension between Washington and the Vatican.

Rubio’s visit follows President Donald Trump’s extraordinary criticisms of the first American pope in the Catholic Church’s 2,000-year history, which came after the pontiff expressed his opposition to the US military operation in Iran. Leo has also continued to speak for the interests of refugees and migrants, in sharp contrast to the Trump administration.

Ahead of his departure, the top US diplomat dismissed the notion that the meeting with Pope Leo is an attempt to re-set diplomatic relations with the Vatican, which the US has relied on as a humanitarian partner for years. He did acknowledge, however, that “there’s a lot to talk about with the Vatican,” including Cuba.

“The trip is really not tied to anything other than the fact that it would be normal for us to engage with them,” Rubio said at a White House press briefing Tuesday.

His trip to Rome and the Vatican comes as Trump has lashed out not only at the pope for his views on the war but also lambasted the US’ longtime European allies – further testing the transatlantic relationship in ways not seen in decades. Rubio will meet on Friday with Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni amid ongoing criticism by Trump for what he said was Italy’s lack of support for the US’ war against Iran.

Rubio will meet the pope in the Vatican’s apostolic palace on Thursday morning, and he is also expected to sit down with other top Vatican officials including Cardinal Pietro Parolin, the Holy See’s Secretary of State.

It is the second meeting between Rubio, who is a devout Catholic, and the Chicago-born pope, and the first known meeting between a member of the administration and Leo in almost a year. Rubio and Vice President JD Vance met him after his inauguration mass last year.

In a lengthy Truth Social post last month, Trump criticized Leo as “WEAK on Crime, and terrible for Foreign Policy.”

“Leo should get his act together as Pope, use Common Sense, stop catering to the Radical Left, and focus on being a Great Pope, not a Politician. It’s hurting him very badly and, more importantly, it’s hurting the Catholic Church!,” Trump wrote.

Pope Leo responded a day later that he had “no fear” of the Trump administration and would continue speaking for peace but insisted that it was “not in my interest” to debate the US president. One Vatican official, later playing down the tensions, told CNN with a wry smile that “President Trump is too intelligent to be in a battle with a pope from the United States”.

But Trump’s attacks on Leo are not only unprecedented, but ongoing. On Monday, Trump once again took aim at the pope, saying that he was “endangering a lot of Catholics and a lot of people” with Trump claiming Leo is happy with Iran having a nuclear weapon.

The comments appeared to draw a rebuke from Italy’s foreign minister, who on Tuesday said that the attacks against the pontiff were not acceptable nor helpful to the cause of peace.

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