Structure: ‘Past perfect’

What is the past perfect?

The past perfect (had + past participle) shows that one past action happened before another past action. When we tell a story in the past simple, the past perfect lets us step further back to explain the background.

Take the sudden collapse of Spirit Airlines. The airline stopped flying in May 2026 (past simple), but it had been in financial trouble for years before that (past perfect). The earlier event uses had; the later event stays in the past simple.

Spot the mistake

Each sentence about the Spirit Airlines collapse has one mistake with the past perfect. Find it and correct it.

1. By the time creditors rejected the rescue offer, fuel prices have already doubled.
2. Spirit had filed for its first bankruptcy in late 2024, before it reach a new deal in early 2026.
3. The airline had budget for cheap fuel, so the price rise was a disaster.
4. Thousands of passengers were stranded because the website had went dark overnight.
5. Spirit closed only three days after it had signed the agreement with creditors.

Before you check the answers, look again at your sentences:

• Did you use had + past participle for the earlier action (had doubled, had gone)?
• Did you keep the later action in the past simple (reached, not had reached)?
• Is it clear which event happened first when you read your corrected sentence?
• Is each corrected sentence a full sentence with a capital letter and a full stop?

Now improve your sentences. Look at any answer that was different from yours and rewrite it correctly: a first draft is a first attempt, not the finished version.

CEFR Level B1 / ICAO Level 4

For more practice with this tense, revisit our first past-perfect lesson and its aviation examples.