Latam airline reinstated route between Cartagena and Lima after two years of pandemic

Next Tuesday, May 3, the Chilean airline Latam will resume a route that it had stopped doing for two years, due to the covid-19 pandemic. This is the direct route between Cartagena (Colombia) and Lima (Peru).

Flight LA2448B will take off three times a week, on Tuesdays, Wednesdays and Sundays, and will increase the number of destinations the airline offers to Colombia to five. The other four are Medellin, Bogotá, Barranquilla and the San Andrés archipelago.

Cristina Gil de Melo, sales manager of Latam Airlines Peru, said that the resumption of this route “will boost the hopes of hundreds of LATAM employees who have been working for several months to reactivate this route. All this as part of the commitment we have as an organization, to the reactivation of tourism, the promotion of trade and the connectivity of the region.”

This announcement by Latam is also in addition to the direct route Quito-Bogotá, which opened on April 1st. This route flies on Mondays, Tuesdays, Wednesdays, Fridays and Sundays. Mónica Fistrovic, executive director of the Latam subsidiary in Ecuador, said a few days ago that, “the opening of the Quito-Bogotá route is evidence of our commitment to continue connecting Ecuadorians and promoting Ecuador in other international destinations.”

The airline is facing major changes lately and plans to operate approximately 1,059 daily flights during April 2022, counting domestic and international flights in its 132 destinations in the 20 countries it connects.

Last March, passenger traffic (measured in passenger kilometers rented - RPK) was 66.5% compared to the same period in 2019, based on an operation measured in ASK (seats per kilometers available). This meant that the occupancy factor decreased 1.7 percentage points, reaching 81.1%.

On the other hand, its Brazil branch recently retired its longest-lived pilot, known as Commander Loreto, who led commercial flights for 44 years and experienced the merger between Brazil's Tam and Chilean Lan. He last drove from Rio de Janeiro to Brazil last week.

Aeronáutica Civil reported that due to high demand and adverse weather conditions around El Dorado International Airport, air operations have delays of more than 90 minutes and recommended that travelers contact airlines to anticipate possible changes in itineraries.

Avianca initiated a contingency plan to prevent passengers who are unable to travel during April 19, from doing so by rescheduling their flight, without any additional cost or penalty, a measure that applies only to those who had domestic flights in Colombia between 12:00 noon and midnight.

Since Monday, airport operations have been compromised due to the adverse weather conditions that have occurred in the capital of the country due to the heavy rains that IDEAM had already warned of.

“Cloudiness and moderate to heavy rainfall are expected to increase in the Pacific, Caribbean, Andean, Orinoquia and Amazonia regions, the strongest during the afternoon, night and early morning, and accompanied by electrical activity during times of heavy rain, hailstorms and/or gales, gradually decreasing towards Thursday 21,” the entity said to through a statement.

KEEP READING: