ALOFI, Niue (PINA Nius) — Royal Tongan Airlines is returning the Boeing 737-200 it leases and withdrawing from operating its own jet on flights to Auckland, Nadi and Niue.<\/p>\n
Instead it will code share with other airlines for most international services. However, it is expected to continue to service Niue from Tonga using its Shorts 360 turboprop.<\/p>\n
Air New Zealand now will increase its Auckland-Tonga-Auckland frequency from two to four flights a week. It will use a mix of Boeing 737 and 767 aircraft in code share flights with Royal Tongan.<\/p>\n
Royal Tongan had been operating its Boeing 737 up to six days a week on the New Zealand-Tonga route as well as using it for Auckland-Niue and Tonga-Nadi flights.<\/p>\n
Air New Zealand chief executive Gary Toomey said:<\/p>\n
“We are looking forward to working with Royal Tongan Airlines in this expanded partnership and being further involved in inbound tourism initiatives in Tonga.”<\/p>\n
Royal Tongan Airlines general manager Semisi Taumoepeau stated that Royal Tongan Airlines is undergoing a restructuring.<\/p>\n
He said: “This code-share arrangement will benefit the airline greatly by helping us to reduce costs on the international routes and is part of our strategy for the immediate future.<\/p>\n
“It also will provide adequate capacity and schedules for the traveling public as well as the tourism market by offering four services a week.”<\/p>\n
Niuean officials are meeting with Royal Tongan Airlines this week to ensure the continuation of the Nuku’alofa-Niue flights using the Shorts 360.<\/p>\n
Niue officials are making a stopover in Tonga on their way to a joint consultative committee meeting in Wellington to ensure Tonga-Niue-Tonga services continue.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Royal Tongan Airlines is returning the Boeing 737-200 it leases and withdrawing from operating its own jet on flights to Auckland, Nadi and Niue.<\/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-56730","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\/56730","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=56730"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/56730\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=56730"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=56730"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=56730"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}