July 6, 2020 at 4:58 p.m.
Rhinelander-Oneida County Airport bucking national passenger trend
Rhinelander-Oneida County Airport bucking national passenger trend
According to airport director Matt Leitner, the demand for service to and from Rhinelander-Oneida County Airport to the Twin Cities has resulted in the resumption of the midday summer flight, along with bigger planes and sometimes two planes for midday and evening runs.
"What is happening is they have these two round trips scheduled," Leitner explained. "But the demand is so great, they're adding all these airplanes as needed, and larger airplanes."
Leitner said he doesn't know if people are coming to northern Wisconsin on vacation, seeking to avoid the pandemic, or if there is some other explanation for the increased traffic.
"That I wouldn't know unless I asked them, but I know we are getting quite a bit of traffic," Leitner said. "We're supposed to get two round trips and now we're getting four because they got so many people coming here."
Leitner said Delta is keeping the flights for sale on their website and overselling the smaller 50-seat planes that usually make the round trips and then adding an additional, bigger plane, which also "fills up" due to the airlines' seating cap of 60 percent.
Leitner said passenger traffic was down "March to May" and it looked like the seasonal third flight would be canceled.
Then, around mid-June, demand took off. It has resulted in planes flying "wing tip to wing tip" or two planes on the same "flight" on the last two flights since July 2.
"You can think of it as two flights a day but they're doing each with two airplanes," Leitner said.
The normal planes can carry up to 50 passengers but are capped at 30 while the upsized models carry 90 people, capped to 54. So the last two "flights" of the day are resulting in 34 more people flying into and out of Rhinelander on each of them.
The additional daily passengers are generating more federal ticket fee revenue, which had been reduced to almost a trickle.
"We lost 95 percent of our traffic and any associated revenue," Leitner said. "We'll accommodate whatever traffic they (Delta) will send."
Leitner said he understands that some people are ambivalent about the increase because of concerns about contracting COVID-19, but stressed that the planes are being are being sanitized after each use and passengers are required to wear a mask.
"Delta is handing out PPE (personal protective equipment) kits to all the passengers with face masks, hand sanitizer," Leitner said. "The airplanes are being sanitized and scrubbed. I know they are taking a lot of precautions."
He said the airport has also increased sanitizer stations and stepped up cleaning at the beginning of the pandemic, and those procedures are still in place.
Leitner said that as a whole, passenger traffic across the country is "still way, way down, with a tepid recovery in place."
"Looking at TSA screening data, it's inching up slowly," Leitner said. "But we're seeing a huge increase."
Jamie Taylor may be reached via email at jamie@
rivernewsonline.com.
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