Air carrier flies away–for good

Fort Frances once again is without a scheduled air link to Winnipeg after Nakina Air closed up shop here just 60 days after first offering its service.
And the chances of landing another airline to pick up the service right now looks slim.
Nakina Air pilot Greg Bourdignon said the airline only averaged 1.5 passengers per leg on its Thunder Bay to Fort Frances to Winnipeg flight and back.
To make the trip worthwhile, Bourdignon said his nine-seater Pilatus needed three to four people per leg.
So when their 60-day trial period with the Fort Frances Airport came up, Nakina Air had to say good-bye.
“We had regular customers who had nothing but positive comments on the service [but] the load factor wasn’t there,” Bourdignon said.
“It’s disheartening,” he admitted. “But you’ve got to have your load factor there in order to compete.”
Mayor Glenn Witherspoon said he was saddened to see the company leave Fort Frances, especially after all the work the town and Geoff Gillon, with the Rainy River Future Development Corp., put into re-establishing an air link to Winnipeg.
“I’m not sure where we go from here,” the mayor said. “We have a lot of work to do with our airport–it definitely has to have more activity.”
Mayor Witherspoon said the new terminal being built might help attract potential airline services, perhaps even one with a link to a major airline out west such as Canadian.
“We have to get in mind of Fort Frances as a jumping off spot,” he said. “All these things are easy to say but harder to do.
“The big thing is we need to offer something to Winnipeg,” he stressed. “With Nakina’s cancelling out, it makes our work harder.”
Gillon said the next step from an economic development point of view is to get an understanding as to why Nakina couldn’t fly here, and go from there.
But he also noted Fort Frances has a problem no other airport in Northwestern Ontario has to deal with–another airport just a few miles away.
“Because we are where we are, if you’re a traveller, you can go to Toronto through Winnipeg, Thunder Bay, or Minneapolis [via International Falls],” he remarked.
Gillon noted it was unfortunate more people didn’t take advantage of the Winnipeg connection Nakina offered, and he commended the company for its efforts.
But as for now, it’s back to square one in the search for an airline service. And the fact an airline just pulled out of Fort Frances certainly won’t help matters.
“It makes it even harder,” Gillon admitted. “We’ll pursue other carriers but, unfortunately, the prognosis is not good.”