Which travel destinations were most affected by damage to the Jorge Chavez Airport runway? | Jorge Chavez | Power outage | Corpac | Short Circuit | Airplanes | Delays | Cancel | ECDATA

In a statement released this morning, the Ministry of Foreign Trade and Tourism (Mincetour) estimated that more than 286 flights were affected and 21,720 passengers were affected by the operational incident at the airport.

Based on an analysis of the flight list published on the official Jorge Chavez Airport website, the newspaper found that 157 arrivals and departures were scheduled during the hours the runway was blacked out. The cities most affected by the suspension of flights are Cusco and Arequipa. Imperial City had 15 arrivals and 18 departures scheduled between Sunday night and Monday morning, while White City had seven arrivals and 12 departures. In total, 52 flights had to be canceled or diverted to the two destinations, which are known for their high tourist numbers.

On the other hand, Sunday’s failure heavily affected airlines such as Latam Perú, Sky Airline Perú and JetSMART Perú. The three companies accounted for 65%, 12.1% and 10.8% of the total scheduled flights respectively. By communicating TradeBenjamin Tulando, Commercial Manager of JetSMART in Peru pointed out that “In total, the lighting issue affected 21 flights that we had to cancel, affecting 3,140 passengers.”. This newspaper contacted the other companies mentioned, but did not get a response.

Ft for tourism

Apart from the technical issue, the impact of passenger inconvenience and the resulting economic cost is far from over. Ricardo Acosta, president of the Peruvian Association of Travel and Tourism Agencies (Apavid) pointed out that, to date, The economic loss to passengers and companies due to this incident is about 8 million US dollars. Additionally, it warns that the number could increase in the coming days as passengers are still stranded and flights are not diverted. He noted that rescheduling of flights and packages by users will continue for another 8 or 10 days.

“Some passengers will now be transferred for a week. Amounts depend on each tourist’s itinerary, hotels, and tours. Includes hotels in Cusco, transfer to Machu Picchu, and train. A complete tour package was purchased. Those people come for 5 days, they spent, but they did not go. [Después de este evento] “I don’t think we’ll hit our target of 4.6 million tourists for this year, maybe we won’t even hit 3 million.” said.

For its part, Mincetur notes that the economic loss could exceed US$10 million. “Not considering the negative impacts on the country’s image and the adverse effects on the planning of future trips to Peru”. Likewise, it said its measures to mitigate the damage include coordinating with hostels to prevent stranded travelers from being penalized for canceling their bookings. It has also asked hotels not to charge extra ‘No Display’ Provision of temporary accommodation in hotels for affected passengers, as well as waiting for the flight to be rescheduled. Regarding travel with train tickets to Machu Picchu, the company has negotiated with Peru Rail and Inca Rail so that they can use their tickets without charging extra.

Acosta recommends postponing the full move out of Jorge Chavez Airport to mid-January, which is a ‘peak’ date in the flow of flights, as are national holidays. This is to avoid the risk of such incidents occurring during peak traffic days.

“They want to hand over the new airport on December 15. This is a big mistake because it is high season and there is no risk of changing the airport in high season. It will move from a small airport to a big airport where people don’t know how to find their way around. “It could be a total ‘shock’ for passengers and airlines” He commented.