In an e-mail yesterday, Parsons at the same time said Northwest remains committed to the Saipan market and will continue its daily services to the island from Narita and Nagoya, Japan.
He said they will also go on with their one-stop service from Osaka via Narita.
According to Parsons, they will continue to work closely with the Marianas Visitors Authority and the CNMI government and will review the market as soon as the economic conditions improve.
MVA Executive Director Perry Tenorio said the loss of Northwest’s Osaka-Saipan flights means 20 percent fewer air seats from Japan.
“That’s a tremendous loss from our major tourism market,” he said in a media release.
MVA, he added, is meeting with its travel partners to look at ways to replace the loss of seats.
According to Tenorio, “the new Osaka-Saipan flights commenced by Asiana Airlines in Dec. 2008 will help mitigate some of the loss. Asiana Airlines is operating three times weekly for an anticipated six months using A321-200 aircraft, which provide 177 seats (12 business class seats and 165 economy class seats), or about 12,744 seats total for the operating period.”
“Further assistance from our travel partners is desperately needed right now,” said Tenorio. “However, given the fact that tourism is down worldwide, the timing could not be worse, and we are making a tremendous request.”
