T’way launches 17 charter flights to NMI

Although the CNMI’s Tourism Resumption Investment plan program has officially been disbanded, the program has proven itself beneficial to South Korean airlines that continue to increase air seats to the CNMI.

During a Marianas Visitors Authority regular board meeting yesterday, Sejin Kim, MVA South Korea office manager, said that T’way Air has decided to add 17 more charter flights to the CNMI starting this month until the month of March.

“T’way Air will add 17 charter flights this February for the Korea market. No subsidy by the CNMI. Prior to that, T’way added two additional daily flights starting last Jan. 27,” she said.

The charters, which are a collaborative effort by MVA’s tour agency partners, is expected to provide over 6,000 additional seats.

In addition, these charters are nearly, if not completely, filled as of yesterday.

“We have 100% of the sales of the charter flights so we’re expecting over 90% of the load factor in February. [This is] over 6,000 seats supplied by T’way alone,” Kim said.

In addition, T’way will also provide charter flight to the CNMI from March to April before resuming regular daily flights on April 26.

“T’way will also have another charter flight from March to April, which will be every Wednesday and Saturday. [Also] effective April 26, T’way will resume daily flights,” said Kim.

Before closing out her announcement, Kim added that Jeju Air will also be resuming its twice daily flight service in April.

“Jeju will also resume two daily flight service in April. This will provide an additional over 5,000 seats to the CNMI for the month of April,” she said.

“This gives us a good opportunity to increase the number of passengers coming to the CNMI,” Kim added.

Also announced last Tuesday was the disbandment of the TRIP program, which played a large role in the return of the South Korean tourism market.

During MVA’s regular board meeting, all five remaining MVA board members unanimously agreed to the disbandment of the program. MVA, however, still has an ad hoc committee that’s dedicated to tourism resumption.

According to acting MVA chair Gloria Cavanagh, the disbandment had to be done for two primary reasons: one is that the CNMI administration that created the program has already been replaced by a new administration, and two, there is no more federal funding to back this program.