Nov. 19—MORRISVILLE — The first international flight to leave Raleigh-Durham International Airport in nearly eight months took off shortly after 8 a.m. Thursday, bound for Cancun, Mexico.
JetBlue Flight 1933, with 38 passengers aboard, was hailed as a milestone at RDU, which like all airports is still struggling after the coronavirus pandemic decimated air travel last spring. Overall passenger traffic is still down about 70% compared to last year, and there hasn't been an international flight at the airport since an Air Canada jet arrived from Toronto on the evening of March 31.
"We lost all international connections when passenger traffic dropped to 3% last spring," said Crystal Feldman, vice president of communications. "So it's an exciting development to have international routes returning to RDU. It's an indication that traffic is starting to pick up."
JetBlue plans to add another international flight, to Montego Bay, Jamaica, starting Saturday, as part of an expansion of service announced in September that focuses on warm-weather destinations in Florida, the Caribbean and Latin America. Feldman noted that JetBlue has never flown internationally from RDU before.
"It means they're betting on RDU's and the region's recovery," she said.
The JetBlue plane to Cancun would normally seat 158 passengers. With the airline blocking out 30% of its seats to space people out, Thursday's flight still had 78 unsold seats.
Victoria Vieira of Raleigh was making her first flight since the pandemic broke last winter and said she wasn't worried about contracting the coronavirus.
"It seems like everyone wears the mask properly. Social distancing has been taken into consideration," Vieira said. "I feel comfortable."
Vieira and her boyfriend Myiles Harrison are taking a short vacation to a resort in Cancun, where they also expect to feel safe. "We'll probably stay there, do our own thing away from everybody," she said.
Selina Quinn of Raeford isn't worried either. Quinn, a massage therapist, says she'd be concerned if she had some underlying health problems, but she's healthy.
"This is the only time I wear a mask," she said, waiting to board the flight where masks are required. "Otherwise, I am not a mask wearer."
Quinn was traveling with a friend and figured they'd spend most of the time outside in Cancun, properly distanced from other people. She didn't know her flight would be the first to Cancun or any other foreign destination from RDU since last spring.
"It was an excellent deal," she said. "And when they said it was a direct flight, even better."
Return of other international flights unclear
The status of RDU's two trans- Atlantic flights, to London and Paris, remains uncertain. American and Delta airlines are planning to resume the flights next spring, but government travel restrictions or a lack of travelers could push that back, said RDU spokeswoman Stephanie Hawco.
"International demand is still lagging considerably behind domestic demand, making it difficult to determine at this time whether a spring launch is realistic," Hawco wrote in an email.
American Airlines has flown daily to London's Heathrow Airport for years, while Delta Air Lines began daily nonstops to Paris Charles de Gaulle Airport in May 2016.
Meanwhile, Air Canada is now booking nonstop flights between RDU and Toronto and Montreal beginning Jan. 11, Hawco said. The U.S. and Canada agreed to restrict nonessential travel between the two countries in March, and that policy remains in place at least through Saturday, according to the latest tweet from acting Homeland Security Secretary Chad Wolf.
"Another extension of Canadian trans-border travel restrictions would force Air Canada to cancel these operations," Hawco wrote in her email. "But the fact that the flights are currently being sold is a positive indication that they are committed to returning to the RDU market."
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