Tupelo Regional boardings getting back to normal
May 11—TUPELO — Passenger boardings nosedived last year due in no small part to airlines cutting back service in the midst of the pandemic, but travelers are once again flying.
For the second straight month — and the first time since January and February of last year, prior to the lockdowns — Tupelo Regional Airport boarded more than 1,000 passengers.
In April, Contour Airlines, which provides service between Tupelo and Nashville, posted 1,194 boardings. That compares to a paltry 87 a year earlier.
Through the first four months of this year, there have been 3,423 boardings, nearly even with last year over a similar period. But with restrictions in place through most of last year and into the first couple of months of 2021, Tupelo and Contour struggled to fill planes.
As those restrictions have been lifted, and the larger legacy airlines are filling their planes again as more people are willing to travel.
Airport and airline officials are hoping the momentum can be sustained. In 2019, Tupelo saw nearly 16,000 boardings, the most in a decade. And for 22 months — from May 2018 until February of last year — the airport flew at least 1,000 passengers a month.
While the major airlines suffered financial losses in the past year, they are poised to recover in the next year or two.
According to ETF Trends, analysts at consulting firm Oliver Wyman predict that U.S. domestic air travel will fully recover by early 2022. Wyman's Airline Economic Analysis 2020-2021, says that vaccination efforts are moving much more quickly than earlier anticipated, potentially resulting in a nationwide return to pre-COVID domestic travel conditions by next year. Business and international travel, on the other hand, may take another year to fully rebound.
That increase will no doubt help Contour Airlines, whose hub in Nashville allows Tupelo Regional passengers to connect to 45 of the top 50 destinations in the U.S.
