Sask. airports see slow traffic for holidays

Saskatchewan's two largest airports saytraffic is still incredibly slow.

The most recent complete data for the Saskatoon International Airport is from November 2020. It shows an 85 per cent reduction in passenger traffic compared to November 2019.

"We have not seen an increase in traffic since August, and have been down month-over-month since then,"CJ Dushinski,vice president, business development and service quality at the Saskatoon airport, said in an email.

"On average in December 2020 we had approx. 300 departing passengers per day, compared to over 2,000 departing passengers/day in 2019."

James Bogusz,president and CEO ofthe Regina Airport Authority, saidthat airportis in a similar situation.

Traffic dropped severely in Aprilto the lowest point the airport had ever seen. It then climbed a bit in the summer. Now, Boguszsaid it's dropping again.

"We had certainly, of course, our slowest Christmas on record," he said in an interview. "Given that Christmas and January and February are typically our busiest months, it's been a huge blow."

Pre-pandemic, the Regina Airport Authority employed 55 to 57 people in the winter and 50 year-round.

"Unfortunately, now we're down to 40, so we've had a dramatic decrease in our own staffing," Bogusz said.

Travel guidelines on the province's website state thatinterprovincial travel should be limited and that international travel is not recommended at this time.