MONTEGO BAY, St James — Hurricane Melissa has pushed Jamaica’s aviation sector into yet another reset, according to Audley Deidrick, president and CEO of the Airports Authority of Jamaica (AAJ). He made the disclosure while addressing the MBJ Airports Limited biannual forum at Sangster International Airport on Wednesday.

Deidrick also explained that Jamaica’s overall passenger numbers for 2024 came in at just over 6.8 million, which was about two per cent lower than the 2023 peak. He added that MBJ handled 5.1 million passengers, a three per cent decline, making it the airport most affected by the challenges faced in 2024.

“We are suddenly in another reset cycle of our travel and tourism industry, and by extension, our aviation traffic. While the early months of 2025 continued the sluggish traffic growth the combination of an improved travel advisory from the US, and several major sporting and entertainment events which took place in Jamaica, resulted in a turnaround of the traffic growth emerging from the middle of 2025. So we were just in that reset of the growth trajectory,” he said.

“However, the arrival of Hurricane Melissa on October 28 reversed those expectations, and as I said before, it has reset our aviation traffic base, almost in a similar manner to what took place in 2020 with the COVID-19 pandemic. You’ll have a graph with two major dips in it for those two periods,” he added.

Deidrick told stakeholders that the country had only recently regained its aviation momentum following the COVID-19 pandemic. He noted that the strong rebound was expected to continue into 2024, but several external shocks disrupted the trend.

“Our aviation traffic achieved its highest point in 2023, posting total traffic of seven million passengers, with SIA (Sangster International Airport) posting 5.27 million, and NMIA (Norman Manley International Airport), 1.73 million,” he reflected

“However, 2024 brought some exogenous factors, such as the negative travel advisories from our major travel destination, the USA; Hurricane Beryl, which took place last year, we all remember; US election, which took place last year as well, among other things, which combined to create a wobble in our aviation traffic growth in 2024,” he added.

He noted that despite the slump, the sector had been on track for a rebound fuelled by rising tourist arrivals, with projections pointing to 6.9 million passengers in 2025 — until Hurricane Melissa abruptly derailed those expectations.

The AAJ head warned that SIA’s projections have shifted sharply downward because of extensive hotel damage, with the airport now expected to handle as many as two million fewer passengers.

“Given the extensive damage to the hotel properties in the catchment area which serves SIA, its heavy reliance on 95 per cent of tourist traffic and the times projected for these hotels to reopen, SIA’s traffic for 2025 and 2026 is now projected at 4.3 million passengers and 4.1 million passengers, respectively. NMIA traffic projections are expected to remain intact. As I said, NMIA was minimally affected,” he said.

He noted that NMIA reopened on “October 29 for relief flights and on October 30 for commercial flights,” while SIA “reopened the operable sections of the airport on October 30 for relief flights and commenced receiving commercial flights on November 1.”

Deidrick also highlighted ongoing growth at Ian Fleming International Airport (IFIA).

“The airport which welcomed American Airlines in February 2024 to serve Miami International Airport continues to perform with steady growth. Coming from twice weekly service American Airlines is currently doing daily service into IFIA and will increase this to twice daily on Sundays in December and over the Christmas season, December 18 to January 5,” he revealed.