The two latest routes are Fort Lauderdale to Governor’s Habour, Eleuthera and Old Bight, Cat Island.
Earlier in the week, the airline introduced service from Fort Lauderdale to Grand Bahama and Exuma.
Thomas Cooper, the airline’s president, said during a ceremony at Old Bight after the inaugural flight, that the airline saw the service as a wonderful opportunity to connect Cat Island to the rest of the world.
“We think with our record of reliability and professionalism in our company that we will be an asset to Cat Island,” Mr. Cooper said. “We are sure that with your aggressive marketing, you (Cat Island) would also be good for us.”
He added that the airline had an excellent on time record.
“We run better than any other airline with 220 flights per day,” Mr. Cooper said. “We are on time within 15 minutes, we rank higher than anyone in the industry.”
The airline’s 19 seat Beech Craft is expected to make three non-stop flights to Cat Island per week. The price per person on board Continental Airlines is around $240 round trip.
Member of Parliament for Cat Island Philip “Brave” Davis praised the airline’s service.
He agreed that the service puts the island on the map.
“It [will] expose us to the world because when people now think about going on vacation and don’t know where to go and plug into Continental Airlines, they would see Cat Island as a destination to which they could choose and that is important,” Mr. Davis said.
Mr. Davis pointed out that because Cat Island has a rich history of slave ruins, it has more to offer visitors than most of the other Family Islands.
He said the service is needed particularly because a 100-room hotel development will soon come on stream on the island.
“We hope that would come on stream and many of the other small resorts would be able to tap into that interest that would be created by Continental Connections coming into Cat Island from the United States.”
Mr. Davis called on Cat Islanders to treat the visitors to their shores with respect and pride if they would like to see them return.
“If someone visits your home, the one way you can get them to come back, would be if you treat them nice and with respect,” he said.
Louise Seymour Snell, who manages the Pompey Rock Villas Resort, was also excited by the new airline service. She believes her business and others would be boosted as a result.
“We were waiting and ready for this flight to arrive on Cat Island,” Mrs. Snell said. “This flight is like a blessing for both hoteliers and locals.”
Boosting airlift is a key element of ongoing tourism efforts, especially to the Family Islands where the government is trying to solidify anchor developments.
Senior Director of Family Island Development for the Ministry of Tourism Angela Cleare said the ministry is pleased to be a part of the effort to bring more airlift to such destinations.
Ms. Cleare said that the Ministry of Tourism is attempting to set up a tourism advisory board, which will look into all aspects of improving the various tourism products on the islands.
“We are working closely with civil aviation and the next step is to improve tours,” she said. “Cat Island is the heritage cultural centre of The Bahamas. [It has] more plantation ruins, more old churches, and if you look at most of the top Bahamian artists, they are from Cat Island.”
A new campaign that the Ministry of Tourism recently launched prominently features Cat Island.
The campaign, known as “Island Hopping”, is expected to run year round encompassing the Ministry of Tourism’s vision of keeping the hotels filled throughout the year.
It is envisioned that more money will be spent to further develop the campaign.
By Yvette Rolle-Major, The Bahama Journal
