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By Victor Kaisar

Holiday Travel

Kamloops Airport bracing for increased passenger volumes during holiday season

Dec 22, 2024 | 3:40 PM

KAMLOOPS — With schools officially out for the next two weeks, the busy holiday travel season is upon us, and at Kamloops Airport its no exception.

YKA Managing Director Ed Ratuski says while November passenger levels dropped unexpectedly after WestJet reduced some of its flights, he’s expecting the numbers to rebound in December.

“The flights right now that are operating are between 96 and a 100 per cent full, every flight,” Ratuski said.

“A couple of years ago, we made significant improvements to the passenger screening process, so there are no issues there in terms of handing the traffic through Kamloops for this of year.”

There are currently nine flights a day at Kamloops Airport – four to Vancouver operated by Air Canada, three to Calgary operated by WestJet, and two to Victoria operated by Pacific Coastal Airlines.

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“People should be aware when they’re travelling, especially during the holidays to expect that flights would be full,” Ratuski said. “They’ll hear that information from the airlines about carry-on baggage and they should be prepared to check bags or check them at the gate, if needed.”

“If people are travelling through with connecting flights, they should be aware of their connecting flights and whatever requirements the have to do to make those connections.”

Overall passenger numbers at Kamloops Airport are up, even though the summer months weren’t as busy as expected. The airport has seen 233,947 passengers between January and September this year, compared to the 227,478 passengers during the same nine month period in 2023.

In all, there were 311,696 passengers processed at YKA through 2023, about 50,000 shy of the record of 361,586 set in 2019, before COVID-19 reared its ugly head, causing a significant drop in 2020 and 2021 because of restrictions on non-essential travel.

There was a chance that 2024 could have been a record year, if everything went according to plan. But with 127,640 passengers needed between October and December to surpass the 2019 record, that milestone is looking unlikely.