Hamilton International Airport

[LikeHamilton]

PLAY Airlines start on Thursday (tomorrow). I understand they close to full on most of the flights and the the airline is happy with the loads!

[Djeffery]

Originally Posted by LikeHamilton

PLAY Airlines start on Thursday (tomorrow). I understand they close to full on most of the flights and the the airline is happy with the loads!

Hopefully true as my daughter is coming back from Scotland at the end of July with them.

[JakeLRS]

Originally Posted by LikeHamilton

PLAY Airlines start on Thursday (tomorrow). I understand they close to full on most of the flights and the the airline is happy with the loads!

Took a gander at the seat maps for tomorrows flights, not many seats available to choose from!

Local press should give us a very good look at the inaugural celebrations and airport/airline interviews.

[JakeLRS]

Either Flair is eyeing a Hamilton Sun route or this is just poor journalism from CHCH…

https://www.chch.com/hamilton-intern...-from-iceland/

WestJet recently announced it would take over and consolidate both Swoop and Sunwing into its main carrier.

Airport officials say there is still room for another discount carrier in Hamilton. The CEO of Flair says that even though there is only one flight out of Hamilton now, he says adding more is not out of the question.



EDIT: the video says PLAY, not flair. Still would be nice for flair to return…

[SteelTown]

It appears Billy Bishop Toronto City Airport is getting US Customs preclearance with tomorrow's announcement.

https://www.newswire.ca/news-release...882986852.html

Why doesn't YHM have preclearance yet?

[JakeLRS]

Originally Posted by SteelTown

It appears Billy Bishop Toronto City Airport is getting US Customs preclearance with tomorrow's announcement.

https://www.newswire.ca/news-release...882986852.html

Why doesn't YHM have preclearance yet?

YTZ has several US bound flights daily year round.

I’m sure if we ever get consistent trans border service year-round that isn’t Sun service, it would be considered. But it definitely won’t happen with the ancient bus terminal we use for passenger flights!

[LikeHamilton]

This has been in the works since 2016. It was originally announced 2 years ago. This is only the 9th airport in Canada to get US pre clearance. This was a package for Billy Bishop and Quebec City to get pre clearance. Quebec City is still waiting. US customs has to approve it as they pay for some of the build and pay and supply all of the staff. I believe an airport has to has close to half a million passengers a year to the US to get pre clearance.

[King&James]

Just flew out of BB, great little airport which for sure has less customer lounge space than YHM, but wow what a different experience. Saw that BB does 2.8MM annual volume, granted smaller planes so can spread the volume out.

[SteelTown]

Swoop suspends flights from Hamilton to Las Vegas
The Steeltown-to-Sin City route suspension comes a month after WestJet announced it would be winding down Swoop’s operations.

https://www.thespec.com/business/swo...0765720fb.html

Hamiltonians looking to play their hand in Las Vegas will now have to look elsewhere for flights to Sin City.

Swoop spokesperson Julia Brunet confirmed in an email the airline will be suspending its route between Steeltown and Las Vegas after July 26 and through to Oct. 28.

[drpgq]

Obviously there's a market, but it is disappointing.

[Zmonkey]

Originally Posted by SteelTown

Swoop suspends flights from Hamilton to Las Vegas
The Steeltown-to-Sin City route suspension comes a month after WestJet announced it would be winding down Swoop’s operations.

https://www.thespec.com/business/swo...0765720fb.html

Hamiltonians looking to play their hand in Las Vegas will now have to look elsewhere for flights to Sin City.

Swoop spokesperson Julia Brunet confirmed in an email the airline will be suspending its route between Steeltown and Las Vegas after July 26 and through to Oct. 28.

Swoop is moving 5 of its 16 planes to Westjet this summer, including full painting and rebraning.
As Swoop loses planes, except other routes to be cut.

[mattgrande]

I was talking to someone who works at Swoop as a flight attendant. They've been told that WestJet is leaving YHM once the Swoop changeover is complete.

[cooke442]

Originally Posted by mattgrande

I was talking to someone who works at Swoop as a flight attendant. They've been told that WestJet is leaving YHM once the Swoop changeover is complete.

Let's hope that YHM is working hard to sway other low cost airlines (Flair, Jetlines, Lynx).

[Zmonkey]

Originally Posted by cooke442

Let's hope that YHM is working hard to sway other low cost airlines (Flair, Jetlines, Lynx).

Flair has a sweetheart subsidy from Waterloo region. They were also given large discounts from Pearson to fly from there (in exchange for poor gates, mediocre timings etc).

Its doubtful that Flair does a third airport in the region.

The biggest thing Hamilton should do is push for WestJet to keep as many of the Swoop flights, but as West Jet. It may mean some government money, but Waterloo did it for Flair, Ottawa did it for Porter.

[YYCguys]

Originally Posted by mattgrande

I was talking to someone who works at Swoop as a flight attendant. They've been told that WestJet is leaving YHM once the Swoop changeover is complete.

Interesting that a Swoop employee has been told this, but Westjet employees have not!

[JakeLRS]

Originally Posted by mattgrande

I was talking to someone who works at Swoop as a flight attendant. They've been told that WestJet is leaving YHM once the Swoop changeover is complete.

Doesn’t necessarily mean the end for all routes.

Westjet served LAS, MCO, YEG, YHZ, and YYC without having a crew base here. We could very well see these routes picked up by Westjet in this upcoming weekends schedule release.

Hope isn’t lost yet

[shoelessjoe]

Swoop has a YHM/YYZ co-terminal crew base. With Swoop going away, that base obviously goes away as well. I am going to cast a wide net here and say the closure of that base is likely the source of the "rumour" that WS would leave YHM entirely -- they have a long history here, it would seem to be an odd time to close the station (particularly in light of WS growing with the addition of the WO and WG 737s) and a concerted effort to build up their operation domestically.

Originally Posted by JakeLRS

Doesn’t necessarily mean the end for all routes.

Westjet served LAS, MCO, YEG, YHZ, and YYC without having a crew base here. We could very well see these routes picked up by Westjet in this upcoming weekends schedule release.

Hope isn’t lost yet

[ScreamingViking]

Originally Posted by shoelessjoe

Swoop has a YHM/YYZ co-terminal crew base. With Swoop going away, that base obviously goes away as well. I am going to cast a wide net here and say the closure of that base is likely the source of the "rumour" that WS would leave YHM entirely -- they have a long history here, it would seem to be an odd time to close the station (particularly in light of WS growing with the addition of the WO and WG 737s) and a concerted effort to build up their operation domestically.

Let's hope -- your premise sounds reasonable. And everyone knows how rumours tend to mutate as they spread.

If WestJet leaves a second time it would be a smaller gut-punch, but it would hurt nonetheless. The airport has shown it's a viable passenger facility but more investment in that part of its infrastructure would help.

[JakeLRS]

Originally Posted by shoelessjoe

Swoop has a YHM/YYZ co-terminal crew base. With Swoop going away, that base obviously goes away as well. I am going to cast a wide net here and say the closure of that base is likely the source of the "rumour" that WS would leave YHM entirely -- they have a long history here, it would seem to be an odd time to close the station (particularly in light of WS growing with the addition of the WO and WG 737s) and a concerted effort to build up their operation domestically.

Long history indeed! They are 100% going to remain flying from Hamilton (YYC, at least lol!)

Anyways, here are my predictions for Westjet's plans for us this winter:
YYC (11 weekly), YEG (4 weekly), YHZ (4 weekly), MCO (2 weekly), LAS (2 weekly), CUN/PUJ 1 weekly. Anything additional (YVR/YXX, FLL, YQM) I would count as a bonus

Also curious to see if they will change any of our Sunwing ops this winter amid the takeover.

[LikeHamilton]

Cargo is really picking up at YHM. There were 2-B747's last night and one this afternoon around 1:30. There were 3 more in the last 2 weeks.