Today the U.S. Department of Transportation gave the green light to six United States carriers to resume scheduled flights from the U.S. mainland to Cuba. Flights are scheduled to begin this Fall/Winter with about 155 flights per week.
It should be noted that none of the routes approved were for Havana as those are still going through the approval process and are expected to be announced later this summer.
The Airlines
- American Airlines
- Sun Country
- Southwest
- Silver Airways
- Frontier
- JetBlue
The Routes
From the United States:
- Minneapolis-St. Paul
- Philadelphia
- Miami
- Chicago
- Fort Lauderdale
To Cuba:
- Camaguey
- Caya Coco
- Cayo Largo
- Cienfuegos
- Holguin
- Manzanillo
- Matanzas
- Santa Clara
- Santiago de Cuba
Update from American Airlines:
Per the DOT Order issued today, American is approved to operate two daily flights between Miami and Holguin, Santa Clara and Varadero, and one daily flight between Miami and Camaguey and Cienfuegos. The Holguin and Santa Clara flights will be operated with a Boeing 737-800 and the Camaguey, Cienfuegos and Varadero flights will be operated with an Airbus A319.
As Ben over at One Mile At A Time points out:
What is far from instant, however, is actually restoring commercial flights between the two countries. Air treaties between countries are complicated matters even under normal circumstances, let alone a situation like this, where they’re making up for decades of non-diplomacy.
More to come on this…
