‘Despite minor setbacks, MSA plans for 2023 still a go’

One of Marianas Southern Airways’ airlines. (CONTRIBUTED PHOTO)

Since opening in August last year, Marianas Southern Airways continues to seek to expand and develop the airline in 2023 as well as meet the flight needs that arise and, despite some minor setbacks that have delayed some of their plans, they still intend to press ahead with those plans.

MSA president Keith Stewart and vice president William Giles both agreed that flights to Rota and Guam from Saipan, as well as flight from Guam to Saipan, have been doing extremely well and only the Tinian route has been the less travelled through Marianas Southern Airways.

Stewart said this past year hasn’t seen any major setbacks for the company and that the only challenges they faced was getting the pilot training program approved in the United States, which took longer than expected, and affected their plans of bringing in more flights than originally expected.

The uptick in the number of flights that they were planning was slowed down by three and a half months, he said, and although it may have not moved at a speed that they’ve initially anticipated and not everything planned has worked through, they are still moving forward.

When asked if they would consider creating an island hop route, Stewart stated that the MSA flights route for now will be focused on the Mariana islands and they are seeking to extend flights to the Northern Islands, mainly Pagan.

As for an island hop route throughout Micronesia, Stewart said they are interested and considering doing that but doing so under its sister company, the Northern Marianas Airways, which would be where the jets are, because they can’t use the smaller planes they’re using for flights within the Marianas.

He says it is still a considerable amount of time down the road. “We are interested, and we are gong to be considering that but that’s down the road a little bit. We want to get Northern Marianas Airways up and rolling with starting service to Australia, Japan, Korea, the Philippines, and then start looking at other destinations from there.” Stewart stated.

He also shot down talk that their inter-Marianas flights require MSA planes to be pressurized. He said it is not true that MSA planes fly up to 25,000 feet. “They don’t. We just need to fly over generally 5,000 to 10,000 0[feet]. So, the flights are almost like an island tour than going up high, but there’s somebody spreading rumors around that we can’t be profitable because our planes are pressurized and we have to go up to 25,000 feet and then back down, which is not the case whatsoever.” Stewart said. “Actually… even if I didn’t have ownership in it, I love flying these much more than other options, because it’s just beautiful, especially on a sunny day, just going over the islands all the way down to Guam.”

When discussing what the public can look forward to from MSA in 2023, Stewart shared that they are seeking to increase the number of flights and aircraft and start building the airline to service more where the need is. With 2022 focused on getting the airline started, he said that in 2023 they would build off of the things accomplished in 2022 and add on and expand more services.

“We are projecting right now to start adding more flights by Jan. 20,” Stewart explained, including making connections for United Airlines for Honolulu flights.

Giles also mentioned the possibility of adding some additional flight to Tinian, additional flights to Rota, and opening up soon thereafter a Rota-Guam, Guam-Rota flight.

Giles said that that, as soon as they can situate how and if the U.S. Customs and Border Protection can man the flights permanently, they see the routes from Guam-Rota and Tinian-Guam opening up. Currently there are 42 flights taking place weekly, with the highest demand for Saipan to Guam and Saipan to Rota routes.

When discussing the highly anticipated Northern Marianas Airways, Stewart revealed that, along with partners, NMA is seeking to bring in the larger jets, and are now seeking approval to be able to start services internationally.

“It is a huge opportunity for the CNMI to be able to have our home-based airplanes, based out of the CNMI—757 jets that will open up the CNMI and have this be a hub and so we are very close to be able to get that launched. We just need various support from the government and community etc. to be able to get this thing going. And we can’t just come and bring aircrafts and then hope everything comes together. We really need the entire community, and we’d love for the entire community to get behind it, because it’ll be transformational,” Stewart said.

He mentioned they just need a couple of months for destination marketing, but they are continuing to work forward to get the international flights going.

Stewart and Giles also expressed their appreciation to the community “We want to thank the community for the support. We know that, as we’ve gotten started up, it hasn’t gone how we have envisioned it going. …As with any business that’s just starting we run through challenges, but we really appreciate all the support we have from the community. We’re doing everything we can to go and just increase service, continually to improve. Even the staff, the local staff that has become MSA, has been tremendous…so thanks to the community, our staff and employee who have come on board with us.”