HARLINGEN — Valley International Airport continues its recovery from COVID-linked travel declines, posting strong passenger numbers for March although still down 38 percent for the fiscal year.
The big problem for VIA is passenger capacity, since many airlines have responded to the travel slowdown by eliminating flights.
“All the planes are full. …. It’s pretty bad when I can’t get a ticket out of here to go to Austin this weekend and I have to drive,” Marv Esterly, director of aviation at VIA, told the airport board at a meeting Friday.
Compared to last March, when the COVID-19 travel factor began to hit airports hard, Southwest Airlines was up 16.1 percent, United Airlines was up 33 percent, American Airlines was up 113 percent, Sun Country Airlines was up 19.9 percent for the month.
“Frontier hasn’t put the capacity back in the market, so they’re down 43 percent,” Esterly said.
For the airport’s fiscal year, total passenger enplanements are down 38 percent.
“I suspect by the end of the year we’ll be closing the gap on that,” Esterly said.
The lack of available seats flying out of VIA can be seen in airline load factors, the percentage of seats which are filled on a flight.
“Our load factors, these are record load factors,” Esterly said. “Ninety-two percent for Southwest Airlines, 84 percent for United, 96 percent for Sun Country, 76 percent for Frontier and 90 percent for American Airlines.”
“Time to put more capacity in the market, guys,” Esterly said. “We’re doing everything we can to see that come back.”
Valley International will add a seventh passenger airline in May, when Mexico carrier Viva Aerobus enters the market, which should help with the airport’s passenger capacity issues.
Cargo is one area where Valley International has continued to show strength despite the pandemic. Still, cargo was down 30 percent overall for March due to changes in how freight hauler ADX (a DHL subsidiary) is moving cargo out of Mexico.
ADX has been flying freight directly out of Monterrey and bypassing using VIA as it used to do.
Another factor is the decline in available flights by Southwest. Southwest uses excess baggage capacity to move freight on passenger flights.
“Fedex was up 23 percent and Southwest is still without the capacity in the market. They’re going to be down,” Esterly said. “ADX was down 76 percent. Again this has to do with the fact that we do not carry (loads from Monterrey) for now, and that’s what’s hitting there.”
Asked if Viva Aerobus planned to offer freight service, Esterly said not initially, but that airport officials have discussed the possibility with the airline’s representatives.
