Iqaluit-Montreal direct flights cancelled after nearly 4 months of operation
All passengers have been fully refunded, Chrono Aviation VP says
Chrono Aviation will no longer be offering its Iqaluit to Montreal flight to the general public, about four months after it was launched. (CNW Group/Chrono Aviation)
Chrono Aviation is cancelling the Iqaluit-Montreal route it started in August.
The company couldn’t acquire an aircraft with more seats that would have allowed it to continue the route, forcing a shutdown as of Dec. 1, David Sade, the company’s vice-president of operations, said in an email.
All passengers who were booked to fly with Chrono Aviation in December have been fully refunded, he said.
Chrono Aviation’s route began operating Aug. 6 with booking open since mid-May. Direct flights between Iqaluit and the Montreal Metropolitan Airport flew four days a week. The company charged $699 one-way.
The company used the route to fly workers to Baffinland iron mine, near Pond Inlet, with extra seats being sold to the general public.
The route will continue to operate for Baffinland employees but no more public tickets will sold, Sade said.
In April, Chrono announced it would be adding a 189-seat Boeing 737-800 aircraft to fly the Iqaluit-Montreal route instead of using the older and smaller 120-seat Boeing 737-200.
The new aircraft allowed for the ability to offer these flights to the public, Sade said.
However, during the plane’s heavy maintenance check it was discovered that the engines required replacement, he said, adding that due to an industry-wide engine shortage the replacement was delayed several times.
“To avoid disappointing our clients and passengers during this period, we proactively chartered flights with other airlines to maintain service continuity,” Sade said.
Sunwing and Flair were operating the route on behalf of Chrono Aviation, but will stop doing that due to “their own scheduling commitments,” he said.
From now on, the company will go back to using the smaller Boeing plane, which doesn’t have the capacity to fly both the mine workers and the general public.
In October, Chrono Group, an aviation firm that includes Chrono Aviation, was put under administration by the Quebec Superior Court after a report showed the company had $74.2 million in liabilities.
“The decision to cancel these flights was solely due to our inability to secure a Boeing 737-800 to sustain operations on this route,” Sade said on whether the liabilities had anything to do with the cancellation.
“We remain optimistic about the potential to revisit and reinstate these services when conditions allow,” he said.
Canadian North *Cries in aviation*
Winner Winer Chicken Dinner – Canadian North
I have been seeing Chrono’s hush kitted 737-219C Adv Combi C-GTVO (s/n 928 – 42 years old) operating under a Buffalo callsign recently, so I have been wondering why Chrono was not operating its own aircraft. Clearly they need the revenue infusion derived from the contract/lease work.
Not being able to secure a replacement aircraft sounds like more of a lame excuse than a legitimate reason. There are plenty of other 737-800s available, but Chrono may currently not have the credit rating nor the deposit required to meet the terms of a lease.
As for problems with maintenance, I have heard from quite a few aviation professionals who were contacted by Chrono through linkedIn with job offers that were ridiculously uncompetitive, so I wonder about the quality of the maintenance they can afford, or are willing to pay for. Many airlines have the financial acumen to realize the benefits of leasing their engines. Chrono’s current financial situation may be due to not realizing the value of investing in maintenance, while not controlling costs through astute systems acquisition.
The 737-800’s CFM-56 engines are pretty solid and reliable, so to have two “unexpected” engine changes seems like trend monitoring, SOAP sampling, and borescope inspection plotting was all lacking. A lack of due diligence prior to the aircraft’s acquisition seems to a better explanation for the route’s cancellation.
This airline screwed my vacation to go home. Now I’m stuck paying three times the cost to get home
I never take my chances , with a start up airline. Did that once comming back from Jamaica , got stuck there in the 80s with NationAir.