American Airlines introduces 757

Viewers who live near the airport in Ladyville may have recently noticed a sleek new silhouette in the sky. The Boeing 757, operated by American Airlines, is the largest aircraft currently serving Belize and is in use daily to and from Dallas. The market in the Central and Western United States is rapidly expanding and according to American’s general manager in Belize, the new aircraft will provide both tourists and Belizeans with more choices and better service.

Luis Alpuche, General Manager, American Airlines Belize

?It?s the biggest narrow body aircraft that American Airlines has in its fleet. American Airlines likes to name its aircraft that are more than the sum number of seats as luxury liners including the 757?s, 767?s, MD11?s things like that.?

Ann-Marie Williams

?What?s the seating capacity as opposed to the others you?ve got??

Luis Alpuche

?As against the 727, this one has twenty-two seats in first class and one hundred and fifty-four seats in coach. That gives us a total of one hundred and seventy-six seats, as against the 727 that only had a hundred and thirty-eight seats; we end up with twenty odd seats more than the 727.?

Ann-Marie Williams

?More room in the aircraft??

Luis Alpuche

?Absolutely. We always have more room. All American Airlines aircraft were reconfigured to have more space for seating, so you?re more comfortable.?

Ann-Marie Williams

?Why is it for the Dallas route and not for the Miami route??

Luis Alpuche

?The Dallas route on last year?s season proved to be very good for tourism. We had the 727 almost full everyday. Not only that, it suffered many weight restrictions and we were noticing that we could not take everybody that we wanted to, so we put in the 757. More seats and the 757 would not suffer a weight restriction because it?s a new technology aircraft, bigger engines and we could take as much passengers as we have seats daily.?

The use of larger and more modern aircraft on the Belize run is not the only good news for the tourism industry. There is a strong possibility that Delta Airlines may begin service to Belize from its Atlanta hub sometime in the new year. Latest figures from the BTB indicate that tourist arrivals in November at Philip Goldson International Airport were down five point six percent from last year, but that hurricane induced drop was less than anticipated. Figures for the first eight days of December indicate a healthy rebound with an eight percent increase over the same period last year.