By ANNELIA NIXON

Tribune Business Reporter

anixon@tribunemedia.net

Harbour Island resorts yesterday said they have especially felt the loss of Silver Airways during the slowest slow part of the tourism calendar and urgently need other carriers to fill the airlift gap.

While increased airlift via other airlines was promised after Silver Airways failed to emerge from Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection in the US earlier this year, a slower-than-normal off-season has caused “suffering" on Harbour Island.

Lee Prosenjak, Valentines Resort and Marina’s managing director, said Briland has been unusually quiet due to the reduction of airlift from the US to Eleuthera. “American [Airlines] and Delta are both on a hiatus and have been since August,” Mr Prosenjak added.

“American starts flying back again on Monday. But the only carriers that have been coming have been Aztec and Makers Air, and they're not listed on the exchanges. So like, if you're in the US and saying, like, how do I get to Eleuthera, if you Google it or if you're on Expedia, then no results come up. So it feels eerily quiet here. It feels like pandemic levels here.

“American is off about six weeks. I think it is sort of from mid-August through Monday. And Delta take longer off than that. I think they finished out August. So they've been dark all September and October. I don't think they start flying again until November. So, they go like eight or ten weeks. But Silver has always been there to fill the gap - at least four or five days a week. That's a big loss," he continued.

“It's pretty drastic. I think that the number of physical people on the island is probably a fraction of what it was a year ago - like 25 percent of the people that were here a year ago the same time.”

Asserting that the time to plan for the next off-season is now, Mr Prosenjak added that boaters would not be the ideal target due to fewer numbers travelling during peak hurricane season. He reiterated that more airlift is imperative

“All of September, we haven't had the ability to get anybody here other than Aztec and Makers,” he added. “Makers, I think, fly six days a week, and Aztec flies seven days a week to North Eleuthera. But you're talking about eight seats a day.

“After the Homecoming Festival, which is the 10th through the 13th, we'll be up a little bit more than what we are right now, but that coincides with airlift coming back. At least American will be one flight a day from Miami. In season, they fly at least three flights a day, two from Miami, one from Charlotte.

“They're smart. They know what their statistics are in terms of that, so they're not willing to fly at a loss. They'll do a week or two at a bit of a loss. They figured out that it's these six weeks that they're not going to fly, because they lose too much money every day by doing it. But, in the meantime, the island suffers," Mr Prosenjak continued.

“So maybe it's Bahamasair that kicks in and does a temporary route, which is probably a lot harder than I'm thinking about, of course, to deal with international regulations about starting a route for six weeks or eight weeks, or something like that. There have been rumors that Western Air might fill that gap and take the route that Silver has left. But that's just rumors. But it would be great to have something happen.”

Another island in need of airlift is Andros, according to Cheryl Bastian, proprietor of Swain’s Cay Lodge. She added that the island would enjoy faster growth and expansion but for high ticket prices and a lack of airlift.

“For some reason, the view is that Andros is slower and we don't need airlift,” Ms Bastian said. “We do need airlift. I go to some of the international fly fishing shows and they're complaining that they don't have enough seats. And so we really want a greater effort by the Ministry of Tourism sitting down with our airline partners, because some of the prices are really high.

"When people think about flying from the United States, they pass The Bahamas to go down to Turks and Caicos and Belize and other places, and the cost is cheaper. So, you're flying just from Florida or elsewhere, and you're paying so much to get to Nassau or get to the Bahama islands, and it's cheaper to fly somewhere else.

“We've got to find a way to work with the airlines to reduce those prices. And we need to partner with the Government and the airlines to do that. We're just tired of talking about it. They know the solution to it, which would increase heads in beds. But for some reason, they just not budging, and they need to budge off of that, because then you'll have more persons coming and they'll make a lot of money," Ms Bastian added.

“So we don't know why they haven't solved that problem yet by reducing the cost and increasing the airlift. Why should south Andros that's really taking off, with a whole lot of hotels, fishing lodges, and you have distributors and travel agents complaining that there are not enough seats.

"We have south Andros persons complaining because you only have Western Air that has three or two flights a week, or whatever they have. Other airlines, for some reason, are having difficulty in getting in there... There needs to be a meeting of the minds.”