Arrivals at Saipan airport soared 30%

Spurred by the Airline Incentive Program implemented beginning last year, total number of passenger arrivals at the Saipan International Airport soared 30 percent , from 33,093 in April 1999 to 42,999 this year.

Records obtained from the Commonwealth Ports Authority also disclosed deplanement figures recorded during the same month jumped five percent to 41,010 from only $38,892 last year.

From the beginning of the Fiscal Year 2000 up until April, CPA records showed the number of international passengers arriving at and leaving Saipan’s air transport facility exceeded the level registered during the previous fiscal year.

This, even as aircraft landings from international destinations that includes Guam dropped seven percent from 277 in April of FY-1999 to only 258 landings this year.

Total number of enplanement between October 1999 and April 2000 was registered at 301,920, up seven percent from the previous year of the same period’s 283,032.

The volume of people leaving the Northern Marianas in the period under review climbed 18 percent to 271,420 from the previous year of the same month’s 230,727 passengers, according to the financial report prepared by CPA comptroller David S. Demapan.

As it has been in the previous months, its direct service between major Japanese cities and Saipan brought Japan Airlines the biggest market share which improved by another one percent in April to a whooping 39 percent.

During the same period, the number of aircraft deployed by Continental Micronesia to the Northern Marianas significantly dropped from 34 percent to 26 percent.

Passenger haul in the first seven months of FY-2000 has exceeded the level registered during the same period last fiscal year although aircraft traffic at the Saipan International Airport lagged behind due to Continental Micronesia’s reduction of 536 flights.

At the commuter terminal, enplanement figures in April increased 12 percent from 9,690 to 10,874 passengers while landings soared three percent from 1,980 last year to 2,042 flights.

In March 2000, aircraft traffic at the Saipan International Airport dropped 23 percent primarily because of Continental Micronesia’s decision to streamline operations in the Northern Marianas during the period under review.

However, increased participation by another United States and other foreign carriers like Japan Airlines, Northwest Airlines and Asiana Airlines to CPA’s aviation incentive program triggered a consistent growth in passenger traffic.

CPA last year implemented an incentive program granting 50 percent reduction in arrival and departure fees to CNMI signatory airlines that are able to bring up their arrival figures by 15 percent from their current traffic load.

To qualify under the CPA Airline Incentive Program, airline companies need not increase flights between Saipan and foreign countries but bring in more people through upgrade in equipment or increase seating capacity.

The Airline Incentive Program has been instrumental in the 16 percent increase in the operating revenues of the ports authority’s aviation division.