Airport traffic up again for Thanksgiving

The first massive influx of visitors to Saint-Barthélemy for the opening of the tourist season takes place, as it does every year, over the Thanksgiving weekend. As with other peak periods, this first event sees an increase in air traffic. The management of Saint-Barthélemy airport already notes that commercial traffic continues to grow, with a 12.5% increase in arrivals for the Thanksgiving period compared to the same period last year.
"This trend confirms the island's enduring attractiveness," says airport manager Fabrice Danet. To manage this increase and ensure optimum aircraft reception, an experimental mechanism for recommending schedules to operators has been in place since November 15. "This system adapts arrivals and departures to the capacity of aircraft and ground infrastructures, thus limiting congestion and ensuring smoother operations during the high season", explains Fabrice Danet.

Flight regularity at stake
The director does, however, highlight a few difficulties that they regularly address with their counterparts at Princess Juliana International Airport, in Sint Maarten. "Congestion at Sint Maarten airport during busy periods remains a limiting factor for the regularity of flights to Saint-Barthélemy, particularly on late-day creespecially at the end of the day, when international traffic exceeds the capacity of Princess Juliana's airspace and tarmac," explains Fabrice Danet. In addition, Charles de Gaulle's capacity, already under strain, is particularly sensitive to the vagaries of winter weather, which requires early management of de-icing and snow-clearing operations, which can cause significant delays to flights to Sint Maarten. A simple 45-minute delay on departure from Paris can be enough to make it impossible to fly to Saint-Barthélemy, due to the airport's closing time and transit procedures at Princess Juliana. "
In order to reduce these hazards, the director believes it would be necessary to anticipate the departure time from Charles de Gaulle airport. "However, this approach raises complex issues, notably in terms of allocating new time slots, managing connecting passengers from all origins, and organizing stopover time in Sint Maarten, in order to guarantee a return takeoff to Paris under optimum operational conditions", notes Fabrice Danet.
While waiting for these problems to be resolved, Thanksgiving visitors have been arriving in Saint-Barth in droves. Before the biggest wave, the festive one.