Aviation head says normal outgoing flights may not happen until year-end
-decision depends on COVID-19 figures
Persons wishing to fly out of Guyana may have to wait until late December or early 2021 to do so as this country will not open up to commercial air travel until it is assured that rigid COVID-19 prevention measures are in place and cases here have reduced significantly, says Guyana Civil Aviation Authority (GCAA) Director (Ret’d) Colonel Egbert Field.
And while the GCAA believes that American Airlines (AA) will be able to resume flying here sometime in July, Field noted that those flights will be inbound only from Florida with a New York resumption not until “sometime in December”.
“It will be done over a period of time and in phases where we will have what we call a soft opening at first, and then based on the capacity of our health services, we will gradually increase. I anticipate that not until later this year or early next [year] that we will have unlimited flights,” Field told the Stabroek News yesterday.
“We must first get clearance from the [COVID-19 Task Force]. So it is not only that the procedures are acceptable to us, because at the same time, the government will be looking at the numbers to see if it is going down. The behaviour of the Guyanese people determines how fast this aviation industry gets going. It determines how fast we open these airports. If they are nonchalant and carefree, then the longer it takes,” he added.
On Tuesday, government announced a two-week extension of the emergency measures that were initially put in place in early April to curb the spread of the novel coronavirus disease and said that Guyanese returning from overseas would be allowed in but must quarantine themselves at home for a mandatory seven-day period, putting that date to June 17.
Five days after this country’s first COVID-19 death on March 17, the authorities here announced that the two major airports would be closed to incoming international flights from midnight of March 18 for a two-week period. That period was subsequently extended until May and then further extended until June 3.
LIAT, Gum Air and Trans Guyana Airways, which operate to Barbados, Trinidad and Suriname and use the Eugene F. Correia International Airport, have all suspended operations.
On May 14, LIAT advised that it was extending the suspension of its passenger services to May 31, 2020 “given the current border closures and travel restrictions within the regional network.”
Caribbean Airlines, American Airlines and COPA Airlines; the main airlines which use the CJIA, are all grounded. Eastern
Airlines and Aruba Airlines also had flights out of the CJIA.
Eastern Airlines is one of the airlines being used for repatriation purposes and it is unclear when they have planned to resume commercial flights here.
While AA has not listed Guyana, its website notifies passengers that they must check with destinations they are booking for before finalizing those journeys as there are restrictions. “Many countries are restricting entry due to COVID-19. We recommend that you check the latest entry requirements before your trip as they are updated often. You can find more information
about these restrictions (by country) on the U.S. Department of State site, or on the International Air Transport Association (IATA) site,” the website states.
For its part, Caribbean Airlines said that it “is preparing to restart operations once border restrictions are lifted and is focused on ensuring that the proper safety protocols are in place to protect its employees and customers when flying resumes.”
‘Trust’
Field had explained that exceptions were made for outgoing cargo and medevac flights, technical stops for aircraft which would require fuel to proceed onwards to another destination, and special authorised flights.
He said that those exceptions and those for citizens stranded will continue until the June 17 timeframe but the opening of the airports will be done in phases and evaluated over periods of time.
“It really is a phased approach and all fluid, based on the environment and so on. I really don’t see an entire opening until the numbers here drop and we have certain mitigating measures in place,” he said.
“The Task Force will evaluate and you know reopening an international airport, there will be stringent sanitization and safety measures you have to put in place. We have to ensure that there is sanitization of the airport, the programme for meeting global measures are in place. All of your procedures and measures which you have implemented must be conducted with a certain standard. All these things will later make the trust between the passenger and the airline better. We have to do what builds that trust and airlines will want to want to come to Guyana,” he added.
The GCAA head said that currently the country’s two main international carriers Caribbean Airlines and AA - have not yet expressed formal notification of resuming commercial or chartered travel and when the latter does, sometime possibly in July, it will be only from Miami to Georgetown.
“Currently the airlines are not all ready because not all of them are available, due to the services being curtailed and some of the restrictions in their own countries. We do not expect American Airlines may be ready to come out of Miami until within another month, but they won’t be ready to service Guyana out of New York until December,” he said.
“It is not only us looking at our health services but we are also looking to see how we can cope with a number of other things such as the number of persons coming on a flight and looking at the size of the aircraft which will come in, that sort of thing. We also have to take into consideration that some airlines may not be able to service as a result of their own [company] restrictions,” he added.
Emphasis was placed on locals playing their part in the fight against COVID-19 as the GCAA Director stressed that it is not for only health measures to be in place but most importantly numbers be reduced and the virus eliminated from here.
“Once the numbers keep rising we will not open that you can go out. Until these numbers start flattening out and fall, people have to understand that it will be the longer we take to get back to normal. The actions of the callous few in here will affect the opening of the aerodromes, airports, it will affect the entrance of their family from overseas and them going to visit their family and friends,” he stated.
“So no, we have not at the moment decided when flights will resumed. The measures will continue until the 17th and it will be evaluated again, except for the special flights. What we will add is the limited repatriation flights of the stranded Guyanese in the various parts of the world. But as for commercial flights, not until the national task force determines the situation in house accommodates passengers coming in not getting required safety measures and here the numbers are reduced or what we call the flattening of the curve,” he added.
Field said that he is shocked at the nonchalant attitude of some persons here as when he makes his journey to and from work daily, he would see groups of persons converged “all over”.
“I am just hoping that Guyanese see that they must make the effort. When I am coming in early in the mornings, I see the birdmen in groups without masks just liming; all crowded. You have crowds on the seawalls at times and people are just continuing callously,” he said.
“Do you realize you are affecting your brothers and sisters wanting to come to this country or wanting to leave this country?” he questioned.
Field said that as the GCAA goes through this “soft opening” it will also give itself room for introspection and evaluations.
“We have a first three or four weeks which is fluid and that is our first phase and depending on the task force we then will accept international workers and diplomats in the next phase. We will have time to evaluate constantly and continue to opening gradually, reexamining the situation as we go until we are there,” he said.