Jan. 19—OGDENSBURG — Breeze Airways has a 97% flight completion rate so far, Ogdensburg Airport Manager Charlie Garrelts reported to the Ogdensburg Bridge and Port Authority board at its January monthly meeting.
He said in December, there were 30 flights with one canceled because of inclement weather, which Breeze made up the next day. That's one of two so far that's been canceled because of conditions that reduced visibility to less than a mile.
"They couldn't come down with less than a mile visibility, as required by FAA," he said.
When that happens, the pilots fly in a holding pattern and wait for proper visibility distance. When fuel gets too low, they have to divert to either Burlington, Vt. or Providence, R.I.
"They've been using Prov a lot because that's actually their crew base," Garrelts said.
He explained that the advantage of landing there is that if the flight crew members have been working their maximum allowable hours, they switch them out and get back in the air. He said they can then take a second shot at landing in Ogdensburg instead of stranding the passengers in Washington, D.C.
So far, Breeze flights have been at a 19% load factor, Garrelts said.
"For 137 seats, that's encouraging," he said, adding that their target load factor is 21% daily. At that rate, they'll log 10,000 annual enplanements, which triggers a $1 million grant for the airport from the Federal Aviation Administration.
"Load factor gives a different perspective from different aircraft," Garrelts added.
Last year, Contour was averaging 441 per month. They need to average 844 per month for only the Dulles route to hit that 10,000.
"The number of deplaned passengers is increasing every month, too. Not a small amount. That's encouraging," OBPA board member Megan Whitton said.
OBPA Executive Director Steven J. Lawrence said he's hoping Breeze's Orlando flights will draw more Canadian passengers, which in turn would boost Ogdensburg-Prescott International Bridge traffic.
"With Breeze starting the flights to Orlando, I think we'll see bridge traffic. I hope we do. We'll see how that affects that," Lawrence said. Hopefully with Breeze flights from Florida, the expectation is maybe we'll see better numbers with that."
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