Southwest Airlines Triples its Flights Between Fort Lauderdale and Havana

Southwest Airlines has the second highest number of flights between Havana and Fort Lauderdale, in Florida. (SA)

14ymedio bigger 14ymedio, Havana, 13 April 2022 — The low-cost US Southwest Airlines will increase its flights to Cuba from Florida starting in May, according to a statement from the company.

In the case of the route between Havana and Fort Lauderdale, the flights are tripled, going from one to three daily. In addition, one more flight will be added to the daily service between the Cuban capital and Tampa on Saturdays.

“The airline’s service, offering authorized trips between the United States and Cuba, is available to more Southwest customers,” the company said in its statement.

Southwest Airlines requested permission to operate in Cuba when commercial flights were authorized in 2016 under President Barack Obama. The airline then began to fly to Varadero and Santa Clara in addition to the capital.

In 2017, with Donald Trump as president of the United States, the bubble of flights to Cuba began to burst. First because of the saturation of the market, but also because the travel measures were becoming more restrictive.

In June 2017, Southwest chose to reduce routes and concentrate its flights in Havana, suspending those to beach tourist destinations.

“Our decision to interrupt the other flights to Cuba comes after an in-depth analysis of our performance for several months, which confirmed that there is no clear path to ensure the sustainability of the service to those markets,” said Steve Goldberg, a company manager in Florida said at the time.

In February of this year, the company resumed its operations to Cuba after the break during the pandemic and is the second airline, after Jet Blue, flying between the cities of Havana and Fort Lauderdale.

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