{"id":379057,"date":"2022-11-04T06:02:44","date_gmt":"2022-11-03T20:02:44","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/?p=379057"},"modified":"2022-11-04T06:02:44","modified_gmt":"2022-11-03T20:02:44","slug":"nma-over-47k-aussie-visitors-estimated-in-phase-1","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/nma-over-47k-aussie-visitors-estimated-in-phase-1\/","title":{"rendered":"NMA: Over 47K Aussie visitors estimated in Phase 1"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"\"<\/a>
Gov. Ralph DLG Torres, right, poses with Northern Pacific Airways CEO Rob McKinney, standing left, and Cabinets officials at the introduction of Northern Marianas Airways\u2019 Boeing 757-200 aircraft last month. (MARK RABAGO)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

If Northern Marianas Airways\u2019 plans go forward, they\u2019re looking at a capacity of over 47,000 seats from three weekly flights from Australia.<\/p>\n

During a recent tour on Saipan of a Boeing 757-200 aircraft\u2014the type that NMA plans to use\u2014an information sheet from NMA indicated that they\u2019re looking at 47,060 seats from Australia for Phase 1 if its planned operation of two flights per week from Brisbane and three flights per week from Sydney is realized.<\/p>\n

The new airline is also looking at bringing in exactly the same passenger load from South Korea in Phase 2 for five flights per week from Seoul, while Phase 3 targeting Japan is more ambitious, with exactly 65,884 seats available for seven flights per week.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe commencement of Northern Marianas Airways\u2019 services from the CNMI will deliver significant airline seat capacity to drive tourist arrivals,\u201d the CNMI-based carrier said.<\/p>\n

The \u201cFast Fact\u201d sheet provided also contends that \u201cisland sun holiday destinations, which boast the service of a national or island-based airline are showing significant tourist arrival recovery.\u201d<\/p>\n

For instance, tourism arrival recovery for Seychelles (96.8%), Maldives (92.3%), Mauritius (80.9%), and Fiji (80.8%) all have shown significant upswing in July, August, and September this year compared to 2019 numbers.<\/p>\n

All four have one thing in common: they all have national airlines\u2014Air Seychelles for Seychelles, Maldivisan for Maldives, Air Mauritius for Mauritius, and Fiji Airways for Fiji.<\/p>\n

\u201cMany island sun destinations have enjoyed a strong tourist arrival recovery following extended periods of border closure, lockdowns, and enforced quarantine requirements. \u2026The introduction of a home-based airline will rapidly improve the post-COVID-19 recovery of tourist arrivals which currently sits at 22.6%,\u201d according to NMA.<\/p>\n

MP Enterprises president Keith Stewart earlier said that Northern Marianas Airway is expected to directly and indirectly inject $400 million to the CNMI economy.<\/p>\n

\u201cFrom jobs and economic benefits just with the two planes, we\u2019re looking at $400 million in benefits to the CNMI. \u2026There\u2019s no other business that we could come up with that will have as far-reaching positive impact into this economy as having a home-based airline\u2026\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

MP Enterprises is the parent company of NMA and Stewart\u2019s earlier inter-airline venture, Marianas Southern Airways.<\/p>\n

Stewart said he is eyeing a first quarter implementation of Phase 1 of the fledgling airline\u2019s plans.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe airline will contribute to the recovery of the local economy by supporting accommodation and tourism industry providers with a new source of tourists while helping those from Australia, Japan, and Korea explore the CNMI,\u201d added NMA.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

If Northern Marianas Airways\u2019 plans go forward, they\u2019re looking at a capacity of over 47,000…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":15,"featured_media":379060,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[900],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-379057","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-featured"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/379057","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\/15"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=379057"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/379057\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/379060"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=379057"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=379057"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=379057"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}