Gen. John “Black Jack” Pershing is credited with saying, “Lafayette, we are here,” in World War I.
Now, Allegiant Air is saying it in Louisiana.
The Las Vegas-based air carrier kicked off nonstop service between McCarran International Airport and Lafayette Regional Airport today, marking the occasion with a ceremony featuring a showgirl and an Elvis Presley impersonator.
Allegiant will operate round trips Thursdays and Sundays, leaving Lafayette at 9:35 p.m. and arriving in Las Vegas at 10:35 p.m. The return leaves Las Vegas at 3:10 p.m. and arrives in Lafayette at 8:35 p.m.
The airline will use 150-passenger MD-80 twin-engine jets on the route. Allegiant is introducing the service with $80 one-way fares for travel through May 15 on tickets purchased by Nov. 16.
Allegiant, the seventh-busiest carrier at McCarran, has no competition on the route to Lafayette, which is 135 miles west of New Orleans and is Louisiana’s fourth-largest city.