While he acknowledges that Tinian International Airport is safe without an instrument landing system, Tinian Mayor Jose San Nicolas said the installation of an ILS would make Tinian \u201cmuch safer\u201d and \u201ca more attractive destination.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cThat\u2019s why I\u2019m pushing for an ILS. By law, yes, the airport is safe but if you have an ILS, it\u2019s safer. It\u2019s very important to prevent accidents,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
He said attracting airlines would be easier if the airport has the equipment.<\/p>\n
\u201cTinian will be more attractive businesswise. As a business, you have to look at safety first,\u201d said the mayor.<\/p>\n
Local authorities have said that Chinese Southern Airlines and Chinese Eastern Airlines have intimated that they would land on Tinian directly, instead of Saipan, upon the installation of an ILS.<\/p>\n
Both airlines fly chartered flights from Guangzho and Shanghai to Saipan twice a week, bringing in mostly Tinian-bound tourists.<\/p>\n
In an earlier interview, Commonwealth Ports Authority officials said that the Tinian airport has been open for direct flights since its inauguration.<\/p>\n
In view of the Chinese flights, CPA said that that the Federal Aviation Administration is willing to train pilots to land on Tinian using Saipan International Airport\u2019s ILS.<\/p>\n
Meantime, San Nicolas said that he would formally request the local delegation to reprogram capital improvement funds for the purchase and installation of an ILS on Tinian.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe talked about it. We\u2019d use CIP funding to fund this project,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
Initial estimate showed Tinian\u2019s ILS would cost $3.5 million. <\/p>\n
The Mayor\u2019s Office expressed confidence that the cost could go down significantly by getting a less costly contractor for the installation and acquiring a more modern ILS system which would not require major ground work.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
While he acknowledges that Tinian International Airport is safe without an instrument landing system, Tinian Mayor Jose San Nicolas said the installation of an ILS would make Tinian \u201cmuch safer\u201d and \u201ca more attractive destination.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-100133","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-local-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/100133","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=100133"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/100133\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=100133"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=100133"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=100133"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}