Pero’s new airline set to launch Rarotonga flights
Kiwi businessman Mike Pero’s new airline plans to launch direct flights from Wellington and Christchurch to the Cook Islands in June.
Pero said Pasifika Air, originally named Jet Raro, expected to win Civil Aviation Authority approval to operate in May 2021, and to launch flights shortly afterwards.
The airline will initially operate three flights a week from both Wellington and Christchurch to the popular tourist destination on two leased Boeing 737-800s.
The news comes after Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern and her Cook Islands counterpart, Mark Brown, announced a quarantine-free travel bubble between New Zealand and the Cooks in the first quarter of 2021.
Ardern and Brown said in a statement that they had agreed on an ‘‘Arrangement to Facilitate Quarantine-Free Travel between the Cook Islands and New Zealand’’.
Pero, who made his name in the mortgage and real estate industries, said the airline had been working with the Cook Islands Government and tourism board since April to get the airline up and flying.
The Christchurch entrepreneur remained tight-lipped about which airline he would work with on the venture but said Pasifika Air still had ‘‘to choose one of the many lease options available’’.
The airline would not be a low-cost carrier and ‘‘fares will vary’’, he said.
The Pasifika Air website says flights from Wellington to Rarotonga will leave at 10am and arrive on the island at 3.15pm (local time.) Return flights will depart Rarotonga at 4.30pm and arrive back in Wellington at 8.15pm.
Flights from Christchurch will leave at 9.45am and arrive at 3.30pm (local time). Return flights will leave at 4.30pm and arrive at 8.30pm.
Pero, whose father was born in the Cook Islands, said the airline was primarily focused on the Cook Islands but ‘‘has always considered’’ flying to and from other Pacific Island destinations.