Early restart of flights from Panama in the clouds

Don’t expect to see commercial airlines from 89 destinations arriving in or leaving  Panama anytime soon.

 The International Air Transport Association (IATA) recommends that Latin American countries reactivate domestic flights as the first step to start the recovery of the airline industry in the region, which this year is estimated to lose some $18 billion as a result of the pandemic and that has forced companies, such as Avianca and Latam, to seek bankruptcy protection.

In Panama, there are only two players offering air connections between the capital city and the rest of the country: Air Panama and Copa Airlines.

Air Panama has air connections to Bocas del Toro, Chiriquí and the Guna Yala archipelago, and Copa Airlines only operates the Tocumen-David route. 

In normal times passengers can travel directly to 89 destinations worldwide, without counting flights with stopovers, such as the one offered by Air China.

Like international flights, local connections have been suspended since March 23 and the tentative date to resume operations in both cases is from July 23;   if the number of positive cases with the virus allows it. 

On Monday, July 6, personnel from the Ministry of Health will join the air reopening commission of  the Civil Aeronautical Authority (AAC) The committee discusses health protocols that flights must comply with.

“Once the Minsa approves the sanitary measures to be implemented at airports nationwide, the possibility of starting with local flights will be studied,” said an AAC spokesperson. 

Every 15 days they hold meetings with the regional office of the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) to analyze the implementation and updating of the protocols that passengers must comply with when entering air terminals and on  board planes.

In accordance with the economic opening program set by the Government, hotels, restaurants and air terminals may open when block four is enabled, but with the upturn in positive cases of Covid-19, in recent weeks, block 3 has been delayed.

However, President Laurentino Cortizo has said that there may be variations in the opening schedules of each block

The arrival of the coronavirus not only caused a forced landing of commercial aviation in the country; It has also disrupted new projects that seek to improve air connectivity between national airports.