American Airlines and Southwest Airlines, along with Expedia are noting an increase in demand for Jamaica by travelers in the forthcoming weeks and months.
To meet the higher demand for Jamaica, American Airlines will be upgauging the aircraft utilized on flights to Montego Bay from their major city hubs of Dallas/Fort Worth, Philadelphia and Miami. As of November, they will be utilizing its new wide-bodied Boeing 787-8 Dreamliner for these operations.
American Airlines operates multiple daily non-stop flights to the destination from several U.S. cities, including Miami, New York (JFK Airport), Philadelphia, Chicago (O'Hare), Boston, Charlotte and Dallas/Fort Worth. The airline also announced that it will be operating non-stop flights three times a week (Sunday, Monday and Thursday) from Philadelphia to Kingston from November 4.
Southwest Airlines has informed Jamaica that its flight operations to Montego Bay near-term are close to pre-pandemic record levels. This demand growth indicated by American and Southwest is further supported by Expedia, which has data showing room night and passenger growth metrics surpassing a comparable period in 2019.
The updates were provided during meetings with the airlines and Expedia that were among a series of meetings held with travel industry leaders across Jamaica’s largest source markets of Canada and the United States. The meetings aimed to drive increased tourist arrivals in the near term and to cement further investment in the island’s tourism sector. The meetings were attended by Jamaica's minister of tourism Edmund Bartlett; chairman of the Jamaica Tourist Board, John Lynch; director of tourism, Donovan White; senior strategist in the Tourism Ministry, Delano Seiveright and deputy director of tourism for the Americas, Donnie Dawson.
Jamaica’s health and safety protocols were among the first to receive the World Travel & Tourism Council (WTTC) Safe Travels recognition that allowed the destination to safely reopen to travel in June 2020. The island has also announced new cruise developments and 90 percent of planned tourist investments remain on track.
For more information on Jamaica, visit www.visitjamaica.com.
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