Casper Flights Reduced by Half Due to Coronavirus Pandemic

Flights in and out of Casper–Natrona County International Airport have been reduced by half in the wake of the current COVID-19 pandemic, airport director Glenn S. Januska said Friday, though other operations at the airport have continued largely unabated during that time.

As of Friday, just six commercial flights were coming in and out of the airport each day between United Airlines’ service to Denver and Delta’s route to Salt Lake City, he said. The airport has also seen a drop-off in capacity on those flights as well, with each airline flying those routes with 50-seat planes, rather than the standard 76.

While this has meant a drop-off in revenues, Januska explained, operations have been continuing on as normal. Though some administrative staff has been working from home to comply with social distancing requirements, the airport still maintains a physical presence with janitorial and public safety staff. On the tarmac, business has continued as usual.

“The airport is certainly more than just the commercial flights,” he noted. “Even if, theoretically, the airline said ‘Hey we’re going to suspend our service to Casper until this is all done,’ we still have to be open. We’re still getting medical flights, Fed-Ex is still running cargo – they’re probably busier now with the way things are getting. You know, we still get customs clearing flights, you still have corporate business flights… [traffic] is down, but we continue to operate.”

However, the losses are significant. Combined, revenues from the landing fees paid by commercial carriers along with associated revenues from car rentals and parking fees constitute roughly 40 percent of the airport’s total revenues.

While flight traffic is unlikely to pick up anytime soon, U.S. Congress passed a $2.2 trillion stimulus bill with hundreds of billions of dollars in funding set aside to help buoy sectors like the airline industry. Of particular interest is a $10 billion appropriation to set up airport grants to support vital operations at those facilities, part of a package to help offset a crisis the U.S. Travel Association estimated earlier this week could cost 5.9 million travel industry jobs by the end of April.

It’s this type of funding – rather than stimulus funding – that is needed by the airports right now, Januska said. He highlighted a planned $9.4 million renovation to the airport’s aircraft rescue firefighting facility, and how the airport will likely be unable to cover the $250,000 in matching funds it needs to get the project off the ground – essentially nullifying the stimulus funding they’re already set to receive.

“You can give us as many grants as you want,” he noted. “But if we don’t have our match because we went through all of our savings, we’re not going to get our projects done.”

Even when the worst economic impacts of the pandemic are over – and it’s unclear when that will be – Januska said it is still unclear as to when prospects will begin to pick up, be it from a downturn in the economy that impacts people’s ability to pay for travel or something else, like a residual discomfort in flying left over from the social isolation policies currently in place. This, he said, could create some uncertainty in the airport’s budget moving forward.

“It’s a tough position for us to be in, because we can’t match our expenditures to what the reduction in revenues are.”

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