JAL to fly to Palau in October

Nobutaka Ishikure, JAL Executive Advisor said the flights scheduled in October will be from Koror to Haneda, Japan and Haneda to Koror.The flights will begin on Oct. 6 until Nov. 4.Haneda airport is 60 kilometers from Tokyo and 10 kilometers from downtown.The airline will now be flying from Narita, Nagoya, Osaka and Haneda and JAL is also planning to fly from Kyushu in the future.Ishikure said the airline usually do not fly to Palau during the months of October because of the low demand.“You know, Japanese tourists come here mostly to dive. And these divers, they say that the waters (in October) are not green enough,” he said.He noted that since May to July is the rainy season, October might be a better month to fly to Palau for the Japanese tourists.Ishikure said that the flights may be extended to November if the Japanese arrivals will pick up in October.In November and December, JAL will meanwhile offer chartered flights from Kyushu City, the largest city in November and December.“We’ll expand the season, we’ll expand the origin (of the flights),” he said.This destination is being targeted due to the big demand for flights because of the full bookings for Continental Airlined from Kyushu to Guam.Flights from Japan are scheduled on Oct. 6, 10, 14, 18 and 30. The airline will leave at 9 p.m. in Haneda and will be arriving at 1:35 a.m.All chartered flights from Koror to the Haneda airport would leave at 3:25 in the morning, with ETA to Haneda at 7:45 a.m. The flights would be on October 11, 15, 19 and November 4.He added that Haneda airport only allows airlines to depart from 8:30 p.m. to 11 p.m. and all arrivals should be between 6 a.m. to 8:30 a.m.Ishure said that Remengesau has requested JAL to accommodate the need for seats for Palau route.Three local travel agencies will be accepting bookings for flight to Japan.The three local agencies are the Pacifica Development Corporation, the Surangel and Sons Travel Agency and the West Travel Tour agency.