Delta delight for airport chief

Delta has extended its seven-days-a-week service to Bermuda out of La Guardia through the off-season and into next year.

The move has been welcomed by airport bosses who say the new route has proved a huge success.

And it comes at a time when other airlines traditionally cut back on their service to the island.

Airport General Manager, Aaron Adderley, told the Bermuda Sun: “It’s very encouraging indeed. The route has really performed well since commencing for the first time earlier this year.

“And now we are served out of all three New York airports all year around, which is very good news.”

The latest air arrival statistics released earlier this week by the Department of Tourism painted a fairly bleak picture of the state of the industry.

And there were significant reductions in air arrivals from Canada in the second quarter, which was put down to Air Canada reducing its service to the island.

LF Wade International has already seen some airlines making spot or selected reductions in service earlier in the year than they did last year.

Mr Adderley added: “Volume is down in terms of the overall number of passengers coming into Bermuda.

“Our focus is very much on ensuring that our existing services are successful in what is a slow market at present.

“The intent is not so much to go out and look for other services right now as we need to concentrate on making sure the planes coming in have enough people on board and are financially viable.

“Bermuda is still in a good position compared to many islands to our south. We have an impressive number of airlines servicing the island and there is no indication that any of them want to pull out.

“The decision by Delta to continue the La Guardia service through the off season is very important to us and it will mean that the number of planes coming into Bermuda this year will be pretty much the same as last year.”

Mr Adderley said he was hopeful the Canadian carriers would increase the frequency of their service next year.

He added: “It was disappointing to see the cutbacks in the level of service by Air Canada at a time when Canadian numbers had increased. But I can say that the results we have seen from the Canadian airlines over the last couple of months have been encouraging.” 

Doppler radar down until September

The Doppler radar could be out of action until next month. 

The system has been down since just after Cup Match when the cooling fan malfunctioned.

A specialist technician from Germany is due to fly into Bermuda on September 9 to fix the fault.

But Airport General Manager Aaron Adderley is hopeful a  technician will be able to travel to island at an earlier date.

He said: “The unit is still working, but the problem we have is that the cooling fan is not coming on automatically.

“Therefore we don’t want to run the risk of running
it and damaging the software.

“We need a specialist to come in and fix it and at the moment he is booked to come on September 9.

“But I hope we are able to come to some arrangement whereby a technician will be able to travel at an earlier date.”