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Northwest to revert back to larger plane
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Posted on Apr 06 2005
Northwest Airlines will revert back to using high-density aircraft for its Guam and Saipan operations beginning April 13.
Richard A. Parsons, Northwest manager for Guam and Saipan, said yesterday that maintenance work on the airline’s bigger aircraft had been completed. “Effective April 13, our regular aircraft that we use for Guam and Saipan will be back on the route,” he said.
Currently, Northwest is able to use only one of its three Boeing 747-400 aircraft, which can seat 430 passengers, for its operations in the Marianas. The two other planes went through maintenance.
In place of the two planes, Northwest is using the 349-seater Boeing 747-200.
Parsons explained that, although similar in size to the other aircraft model, Boeing 747-200 has a different configuration in that it has 67 business seats, which reduced by great amount the number of economy class on board.
“Basically, the downgauge has happened both in Saipan and in Guam. It’s rotated between Guam and Saipan depending on the loads booked. Whichever one has the highest bookings is where we put the third high-density aircraft,” Parsons said.
Northwest, which operates daily flights to Saipan from Tokyo and Nagoya, has a load factor of over 90 percent, according to Parsons.
He added, however, that the airline is not currently planning on starting any additional flights from any market in the near future.
The local tourism industry has attributed the declining arrivals from Japan to the airlines’ moves to terminate flights or downsize aircraft.
Continental Airlines terminated its direct flights from Nagoya to Saipan in April 2004. Japan Airlines subsequently changed its aircraft from the 411-seater Boeing 747 to the 266-seater DC-10 on the daily flights from Tokyo to Saipan.
To woo airlines to increase service from Japan, Gov. Juan N. Babauta led a delegation of government and private tourism officials to Tokyo last Feb. 21.
A similar visit to the airline companies is being scheduled this month.
