Aircalin resumes weekly rotation with Nouv

fifteen months that New Caledonia no longer maintains regular air links with New Zealand. This means the event representing Thursday’s freight transport between Auckland and Tontota. It will be renewed every week until October 28.

Finally, good news on the air transport front. At around 2pm on Thursday, June 24, an Aircalin plane took off from Tontota towards Auckland and is expected to return at around 9pm. There is no issue of transporting or returning travelers, and health restrictions obligate. But the mission of the plane is to transport cargo between Caillou and the Land of Long White Cloud.

Every Thursday

The first cargo flight will be followed by many others since this rotation opens a weekly scheduled service every Thursday until October 28. Enough to make life easier for the many professionals in Caledonia, who have been forced to go through almost cross-country routes, extended deadlines, to bring certain goods into the country.

Fruits and vegetables

“A real opportunity for New Caledonia and for the company, this new rotation will allow direct supply from New Zealand of fresh fruits and vegetables for wholesale distribution, seafood and dairy…”, Aircalin lists in a press release.

Fresh flowers and hatching eggs

And he announced the resumption of imports of spare parts, fresh flowers or hatching eggs! The company specifies that some laboratory products will also be shipped directly from Auckland.

One time trips only

For fifteen months there was no regular air service between New Zealand and Tontota. The only flights made in the context of Covid-19 and the closing of borders were dedicated, in particular, to the repatriation of Caledonians stranded in the country of the Kiwi.

government program

How can this rotation of goods be resumed? Aircalin states that it has been selected by the New Zealand Department of Transport as part of a program called “International Air Connection”. It is based on a financial support mechanism for operators who maintain or establish international air links with New Zealand.

Tokyo et Sydney

Until then, the only regular flights operated by Aircalin were, each week, the three services to Tokyo, in Japan, and the two sessions with Sydney, in Australia. ‘Very high fill rates’, attached to the company, “Some goods are experiencing extended delivery times, which poses very serious problems to New Caledonia’s private or public operators.”