MONTEGO BAY, St James — Sangster International Airport (SIA) has resumed expansion projects that had been halted as it bounced back from last year’s Hurricane Melissa which damaged sections of the roof and other critical infrastructure.

“We had many projects that were ongoing prior to the hurricane and some of those things are well advanced now. We are really at the tail end of the expansion of the check-in area; when the hurricane came, we were right in the middle of construction,” said Shane Munroe, CEO of MBJ Airports Limited which operates SIA.

One of the major changes coming is a new entrance to the airport.

“We call it the western access. It’s going to have a new entrance from Godfrey Dyer Boulevard and into the airport. This is due to the expected growth in the traffic,” Munroe told the Jamaica Observer during a recent interview.

“We’re not only talking about passenger traffic [but also] landside traffic, motor vehicle traffic — and [it] offers passengers an [alternative] exit and entry into the airport,” he explained.

MBJ has been engaged in an extensive, multi-year upgrade of SIA, with much of the work focused on what is called “front of house” — an effort to position the facility to better accommodate vehicles and passengers. According to Munroe, the now-resumed work has been influenced by lessons learned from Hurricane Melissa.

“We take from that experience, and every year we are more resilient. To be able to bounce back this quickly, as we have, it’s surprising,” he declared.

“When people come here they are looking for the destruction, but we have been able to bounce back quickly and we are up and running,” he explained.

He cited the reopening of gates 1-5, which had been most heavily impacted.

“In terms of operations, we definitely are back to normalcy. The recovery is happening; we are seeing increasing passenger numbers, month over month, so certainly this a good trend for us going into spring and then into the summer,” Munroe added.

MUNROE…we had many projects that were ongoing prior to Hurricane Melissa and some of those things are well advanced now