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BCAC Newsletter #2 – Airline News
Authors: David Cojocar, Terry Yoon
The spread of COVID-19 has resulted in much of British Columbia’s air services being suspended. In some cases, these flights represented communities’ only link to the outside world, the suspension of which has resulted in hardship for many. We wanted to provide a brief update on the network plans of some of BC’s largest airlines, with the hope of underscoring the slow, but encouraging growth in connectivity that we are seeing.
Air Canada
Canada’s largest carrier has been slowly but surely rebuilding its network in British Columbia. As shown in the animation below, Air Canada opted to retain five pillar routes throughout the pandemic, which includes Vancouver to each of Terrace, Prince George, Kelowna, Victoria and Nanaimo. June saw the return of services to Fort St. John, Kamloops and Prince Rupert, while July marked the reintroduction of flights to Smithers. Finally, service to Penticton and Cranbrook will be restored in August, and the airline plans to return to its remaining pre-COVID destinations of Sandspit, Comox and Castlegar by September.
WestJet
WestJet has taken a similar, though more conservative approach to its network in BC. The Calgary-based airline retained intra-BC services to Terrace, Prince George, Kelowna and Victoria. However, it opted to hold off on returning service to additional communities until August, when flights to Fort St. John resume. As it currently stands, the remainder of WestJet’s BC network is slated to restart operations in September.
As of its latest schedule filing, WestJet plans to operate to a total of 48 destinations in August: 39 in Canada, 5 in the U.S., 2 in Europe, 1 in the Caribbean and 1 in Mexico. The airline has also opted to retire its fleet of four Boeing 767s, kindly donating their galley carts to Alberta hospitals.
Intra-BC Services of Air Canada and WestJet by Month
Air Transat
After spending over four months grounded, Air Transat resumed operations on July 23rd. Of its significant pre-COVID BC network, the airline has opted to only bring back services from Vancouver to Toronto and Montreal for the time being.
Air Transat also announced that it will suspend its winter services to the U.S. and Mexico from Western Canada, including all previously planned flights from Vancouver. However, it received three new Airbus A321LR aircraft in this summer, so it likely to scale up its operations in the future.
Flair Airlines
Flair Airlines opted to suspend its planned expansion to Atlantic Canada this summer, and instead retrenched to many of its original routes for the first half of the summer. However, on July 23rd the carrier announced additional new routes, many of which are located in Western Canada and the Prairies.
In total, Flair will fly to nine destinations from Vancouver in August: Edmonton, Fort McMurray, Kelowna, Prince George, Regina, Saskatoon, Victoria and Winnipeg.
Pacific Coastal
After temporarily winding down its operations on March 24th, Pacific Coastal returned to the skies on June 1st with limited day of week service from Vancouver to Victoria, Powell River, Trail, Williams Lake, Comox, Campbell River, Port Hardy, Tofino and with flights between Victoria-Kelowna and Kelowna-Cranbrook. This was followed by adding the return of non-stop service between Vancouver-Cranbrook on July 5th as well as more flight frequency to other markets. Pacific Coastal then added three day a week service to Bella Coola starting on July 26th. The airline continues to slowly grow its network and has applied an updated schedule through to October 31st. Further details are available on their website.
Following the temporary layoffs of all of its staff in March, Pacific Coastal has been reactivating members of its team as it continues to scale up its operation.
Central Mountain Air
CMA has focused on expanding its services from its main hub in Prince George. The airline’s most recent schedule announcement lists eight total destinations by mid-September in British Columbia and Alberta, including: Prince George, Terrace, Kamloops, Kelowna, Fort Nelson, Fort St. John, Edmonton and High Level. Many of CMA’s routes are of vital importance to ensure regional connectivity for some of BC and Alberta’s most remote communities.
