Bob Cummings, the CEO of Central Mountain Air, says they remain in a holding pattern when it comes to flights in and out of Quesnel and Williams Lake.
The company resumed flying in some communities back on July 20th, but started off with just 24 flights a week between Prince George, Terrace, Fort St. John, Kamloops and Kelowna.
Cummings says current route performance has been slow to ramp up, so they “remain in a conservative mindset with respect to bringing back more scheduled flights.”
Quesnel Mayor Bob Simpson says the city has also been unable to get clarity on when the flights might be restored but he says it is an active file …
“The airport’s future of course is one of the most significant Covid impacts, not just for us but for all small communities with Municipal airports, and so there have been letters form the Cariboo Regional District, from the City and from cities all over Canada to the Federal Government to deal with the issue of these ongoing airport costs with carriers that are not returning to service.”
Jon Pucek, the Airport Manager in Quesnel, said last month that the city is losing about 30 thousand dollars a month between no passenger traffic and a loss of fuel sales.
The City just signed a new five-year lease and Air Service Agreement with Central Mountain Air in March.
Simpson says that deal included some improvements the city was looking for…
“We worked hard with Central Mountain Air last year to negotiate some changes, changes in fee structure and changes in how they were going to operate out of Quesnel, and we were satisfied with the results we got.  We were also working with them to make sure that they equipped their planes with the kind of technology that speaks to our ground based system so that we could get higher proportional landings.  We have a ground based system that guarantees about 95 percent to 97 percent landings if Central Mountain Air equipped their planes with that, and we had an agreement that over time they were going to move in that direction.”
The new agreement runs through February of 2025.
Jon Pucek, the Airport Manager in Quesnel, said last month that the city is losing about 30 thousand dollars a month between no passenger traffic and a loss of fuel sales.