BA repatriation schedule still in the works
(CNS): Government officials have said that until the borders reopen and commercial flights begin operating once again, the only passenger flights approved to operate during this period are to facilitate repatriation travel. While government said it is continuing to work closely with British Airways to secure a consistent flight schedule to and from the UK, these are not commercial schedules and until normal commercial service is resumed, airline seat capacity is limited and delays in securing a flight home can occur. At present, a flight is set to land in Cayman from London on 2 June but the remaining summer schedule has not been confirmed.
Following a number of cancellations regarding next month’s proposed flights, frustrations are running high among residents trying to book flights, especially families with children and teenagers at school and college in the UK. The lack of a firm schedule for the summer has driven people to book what officials call ghost flights, however the government here has no control over them.
Travel Cayman officials said in a release that when they have confirmed the repatriation flights, the details are published on the government website and on the Travel Cayman portal. But the government is not responsible for other flights posted by commercial airlines, including British Airways online that residents have booked, and any travellers that choose to do that do so at their own risk.
“It has been noted that some airline carriers, including British Airways, advertise and take bookings for non-approved flights (ghost flights) to and from the Cayman Islands,” Travel Cayman said in a release Tuesday. “Given that the Cayman Islands Government has no control over the marketing activities of commercial airlines, and in an effort to avoid confusion with the public, the CIG launched a travel information website which is regularly updated with the latest travel information, including confirmed British Airways flight dates.”
All potential travellers are advised to check the CIG website or Travel Cayman prior to making their bookings. Officials said the next confirmed BA repatriation flight from the UK is scheduled for 2 June, returning 3 June to UK.
Kenneth Bryan the Tourism minister said he was sympathetic to the ongoing situation. “We understand the frustrations that travellers must face when it comes to ghost flights, particularly parents of students returning from the UK,” he said. “Let me reassure you that we are in continual discussions with British Airways on repatriation flights and aim to give as much notice as possible prior to flight departures. I urge the public to check official government channels before making reservations, as the ministry has no control over British Airways advertised flights.”
The ministry is still trying to confirm a fortnightly schedule with British Airways for the summer repatriation flights but it is still in the process of being finalised.
The proposed dates for inbound flights from the UK (London-Heathrow to Grand Cayman) are:
16 and 30 June
14 and 28 July
11 and 25 August
8 and 22 September.
Proposed dates for outbound flights (Grand Cayman to London-Heathrow) are:
17 June
1, 15 and 29 July
12 and 26 August
9 and 23 September
Until the schedule is confirmed the public is advised to follow government information channels for approved flight dates prior to confirming their bookings.
Details of the British Airways repatriation schedule can be found here.
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Just fly from Miami.
Flights everyday available on Cayman Airways from the 1st of July.
There is no way our own airline is selling ghost flights right? So we are opening 1st of July then!
No they will get cancelled and changed to evacuation flights. We just had to pay $450 per person each way (the return was originally $130) for a hospital trip to the usa the return flights were already ticketed but they got cancelled (the same dates) and re-issued once we paid at the higher rate.
$1350 verses the original $390 (3 of us)
Perhaps CIG doesn’t want to make it any easier for people travel. Right now the only thing keeping the economy going is the captive audience so to speak. Plus they won’t be able to monitor that many people in quarantine.
It’s also likely that Panton can’t make a decision on opening the borders because his government will fall apart. Probably because of Juliana – I haven’t heard of her attending any of the vaccination drives. So he’ll just keep kicking the can down the road, hoping this will all go away.
There are still some business class fares available to London at great cost, I would love to know if any of our fledgeling ministers have booked any (for business reasons of course).
You do know how much a sequencing machine is don’t you?
Add the training, cost per test etc.
Not going to happen.
Agreed maybe over the top, but Wayne has been silent, not a sign of a good leader, so time will tell.
I am confused…
1. We are on Amber rating by the UK, so people are not supposed to be leaving the UK to come here.
2. Our borders are closed to most inbound travelers.
3. People in Cayman are not supposed to travel unless it is absolutely essential.
And yet… the BA flights are full for the next few months???
The numbers just don’t add up.
Can someone enlighten me???
Absolutely essential includes partying in Miami.
Miss World or whatever the meat market was, various sports events etc.
If someone wants to party in Miami, why would they book a flight to Heathrow?
Arrival in the UK from Cayman requires 10 days isolation. Arrival back in Cayman requires 10 to 14 days.
I doubt many people are flying to the UK for a one week holiday.
Does this apply to anyone flying in on a private jet?
That is the problem..most of these people are treating these flights as their normal vacation flights and that is not what they are for.
We should be focusing strictly on students coming home and those that need to travel for essential reasons.
Those getting their panties in a wad about their summer vacations need to get a grip.
I know it’s frustrating but I’m sure that most of the people booking flights to the UK are trying to get home to see family that they haven’t seen in nearly two years. If I was able to, I’d be doing the same.
Another way to look at it is that CIG needs to get grip and realize that people don’t want to be locked down anymore.
I agree with people wanting to go home to visit family and sympathize with them but the flights are not operating right now for people to go for a visit, vacation or business trip. These are not scheduled commercial airline flights, they are repatriation flights for essential services and for students to go back and forth to university. This is not an ordinary summer where you can plan a vacation or to visit family. It is unfortunate but we are still in the midst of a pandemic.
These people that are complaining decided to go against the warning from the Governor not to book on those ghost flights and only on the approved flights. Now they are upset, complaining and accusing the Government of cancelling these fights when they did no such thing.
The pandemic ends when you are vaccinated.
Time to look forward and preserve whatever we have left of human dignity.
This is not about pleasure trips, it is about seeing elderly parents, getting cancer care and wellness visits.
Schooling, and seeing sick family members.
One of the reasons that Cayman got an ‘amber’ rating was the absence of on island genome sequencing to detect ‘variants of concern’. Does anyone know whether HSA/Public Health is working on getting genome sequencing. Apart from making travel easier it would be nice to know which variants non-vaccinated travelers are bring to Cayman.
You do know how much a sequencing machine is don’t you?
Add the training, cost per test etc.
Not going to happen.
Bermuda’s is up and running.
Looked at in terms of cost per day of patients being on a ventilator in an ICU because decision makers don’t have relevant information they are very inexpensive.
There are no variants of concern in Cayman, outside of inbound travel quarantine positives, which are few. We generally know the dominant strains circulating from inbound markets. We don’t have the lab flow to justify a gene sequencing facility, including the equipment, and highly-skilled technical staff we’d need to run it. But, we were assured from the Governor that Cayman would be included in the HSA’s vaccinated verification app rollout, which launched last week. With nearly 70% vaccinated, and zero community transmission, we should have the highest rating imaginable.
Genome sequencing is one of the requirements for green rating – Bermuda has their genome sequencing unit up and running with the same population and lower vaccination uptake. They also have more BA flights.
Bermuda does NOT have their own genome sequencing unit. They send samples to CAPHRA just like Cayman.
3 comments –
The ability to do genome sequencing is a requirement for ‘green’ light status at present. We have no control over the criteria set in the UK.
The Indian strain, which is a variant of concern, is rapidly becoming the dominant strain in many parts of the UK and is now present in many areas in the US. If the virus gets in we will have a large volume of samples and no means of testing what we are dealing with. Better to get the equipment and staff now as Bermuda has already done.
Gene sequencing has utility in health care far beyond just Sars-CoV-2
Many people have ended up in a korma including my naan
The fact is: nobody positive with any Covid-19, of any known lineage, gets to circulate in our community because of our border mechanisms. So sequencing the VOCs not getting into the community is a completely irrelevant exercise. Yes we should assume that some of our 3-5 cases of inbound a week may have included B1.617.2 voc, and possibly for many weeks, but it also doesn’t matter.
Until it does because there is a quarantine failure or it does because someone decides to reduce the quarantine period.
Bermuda has had genome sequencing up and running for several weeks and now has much more frequent BA flights with a lower level of vaccination.
And South Georgia and South Sandwich Islands (on the green list) has on island genome sequencing?
Ascension & Falkand Islands? Is this military issued kit?
Tristan de Cunha?
St Helena?
All on the green list.
Riiiight…
No that is not true. Cayman sends samples of positive results to CARPHA for sequencing, so that is taking place.
If only CIG was living in the 21st century and provided an option to contact our leaders via email we could contact them easily and share our concerns regarding their silence on reopening the border. Heck even in the US you can send an email to the president. Of course, the president himself doesn’t read the email but when enough people contact him regarding the same issue the information reaches the target audience.
Why, why, why are they calling these repatriation flights!!
All these demanding comments for the BA flights. We could test the system by resuming flights to Jamaica.
I sympathize with those trying to travel to and from Jamaica – not just Jamaicans but also anyone needing to visit the US embassy (closed for visa appointments at the moment due to covid case numbers) – but the data/vaccination rates there suggest relaxing travel restrictions is a bad idea.
The reality is that CAL has been flying to and from Kingston every Friday for some time. CAL also runs fortnightly return flights from La Ceiba every other Thursday. The returning/arriving bacchanalian/labourers must partially explain some of the inbound positives discovered among 72hr negative PCRed travellers, and possibly a scoop of lab fraud baked into those figures as well. Who knows. CIG wants to keep these trade routes running for some reason.
There have been plenty flights to Jamaica since last year.
I am hoping that work is underway to have Caymanians and residents who have been fully vaccinated to be included in the UK’s new NHS App/database. If we can achieve that then both countries should be confident regarding travel with no or minimal quarantine requirements. That should also help Cayman get ‘Green listed’ and should decrease resistance to more flights to and from the UK.
Do you want Uk residents to be included on Caymans database? You don’t pay anything into the NHS system that already very generously gave you your jabs for nothing. It’s got to be a two way street.
If at some point we are going to open to people who are proven to have been vaccinated then having access to that database would be useful for our border control.
Yeah, that’s fine. There should be no travel quarantines for those “fully vaccinated” with the approved vaccines, administered in approved countries, and/or vetted with approved blockchain vaccine passport apps and/or yellow WHO vaccine passports. The data supports the safety in that thinking. We could be extra thorough and give each arriving fully-vaccinated a course of $5 rapid antigen tests to self-administer and report on for their first 5 days post-arrival to increase public confidence in the safety of that thinking, and reconfirm policy review in 3 months. This is going to be the future of international cross-border travel, and yes, it’s inequitable, but there you go. I don’t think this would present any threat to the bubble of Cayman, while also allowing business and travellers “already across the finish line” to carry on with life.
You have to have a UK NHS number and be registered with a UK GP to use the app. And also contribute to the NHS by paying income tax!
Do all that and a Caymanian citizen!
So the latest from Panton or the only thing is that the census is now needed to determine the actual vaccination rate because they don’t know the true population. A census that does not even begin until October and they won’t know the results until 2022. I wouldn’t count on more flights from anywhere anytime soon.
So insane! So tired of the continuous pushbacks on an opening date. Open to vaccinated people w/ out quarantine in early summer like the rest of the world.
Wasn’t there an article the other day saying vaccines were getting close and possibly opening mid summer?
It is just unfortunate that we have to try to guess/speculate as to a possible plan, because our leader refuses to give any indication of a possible plan (unlike most other leaders in the world).
Total silence on a matter that everyone wants to know something about.
You wanted this job Mr. Panton but are totally paralyzed into articulating a possible plan.
And the census will not count the population. Don’t believe me? Investigate it. Significant numbers of people will intentionally not be counted.
That will make it more likely to show that 70% are vaccinated …
The Australian Medical Association has recommended that Australians and permanent residents flying out of Australia should be required to have been fully vaccinated first as a way of limiting the introduction of Covid when those travelers return. Seems like a sensible idea that Cayman should look at as a tool for safely re-opening.
get a life, it is fleeing while you monitor covid regulations in other countries.
Cayman doesn’t do sensible.
Doesn’t really make much difference if you make vaccination a condition for return without quarantine, does it?
Repatriation – return someone to their own country. Why don’t we call our flights what they are? Don’t know how to open the border flights. We also need to change the name from Cayman Airways to Cayman Tarmac.
We can’t go on like this. There must be a plan and a date set. Businesses and families need to plan. The UK and US are more or less back to business. Most competing tourist islands also gradually opening. The non-vaccinated should be put on notice in time for the remaining doses to be used.
We are not a competing tourist island. We are doing relatively well in all the circumstances. No need for the Indian variant right now, thanks.
Not just competing tourist islands – competing offshore jurisdictions. BVI has ditched quarantine for vaccinated travelers with pre travel PCR and a clean PCR on arrival. Their financial sector guys and their clients are free to travel in and out. Open season for US based clients, and if they get added to the UK green lit, for the UK too. Its one thing to not offer face to face meeting when the whole world is in the same position – but try and compete when others do not require quarantine and see what happens.
How can you say we are not a competing tourist island? If you think Cayman can continue without tourism, and continue to pay Government salaries and stipends indefinitely, take a look at the current Govt revenue vs expense. Spare a thought too for the significant number of private sector Caymanian workers in tourism related businesses now on reduced hours trying to make ends meet. Also, the vaccine is proving to be effective against the Indian variant.
What are we then? Oh I know. Delusional.
The Indian variant is protected by Pfizer and astra jabs… its been proven, so what is the worry when everyone has been offered a vaccine already here?
doing well???…cig is losing $20m a month….
You see, unless one has been abroad, one cannot understand when you say the UK and the US are more or less back to business. I’m a Caymanian, currently in Florida and its OPEN. Yet, every where I’ve been, the vast majority of people wear masks, out of an abundance of precaution. Never has Cayman buried its head in the sand as much as it’s doing now. Perhaps our politicians should get on a repatriation flight and see what is going on in the real world.
In the UK we have our fingers crossed that the US will soon drop the travel ban on Brits (and also be put on the UK green list). Word is this might happen from July, if it can be negotiated at the upcoming G7 summit. If and when this happens, it would be a workable route for people to return to Cayman. We are missing our holidays on the island desperately, but obviously this is nothing compared with what the residents are currently enduring!
Depends if UK and Cayman drop quarantine/isolation on either or both sides.
People do know they can get to London via Miami, right?
But not back via Miami…won’t take non us residents/citizens
But we are supposed to be accepting non residents/non citizens on their short vacations?
Holidays can NOT happen unless quarantine is dropped in Cayman. Most people do not have 10-14 days to sit in a hotel room before starting a holiday.
duh..that is the reason you can’t come..we are not open yet.
Cayman has done well by its people. I am not going to be bothered by this bunch of English people that want to do their “jollys” for the summer to jolly old England. The biggest mistake they made was to allow the first few people to start using these flights for vacations and business trips.
These flights were for essentials service, one of which was to move our students back and forth. We have never had this issue since the pandemic started and the reason is that everyone thinks they can use these flights for their summer vacations..They are not scheduled commercial flights..
idiot. what about CAYMANIAN children that are studying at a UK university.
What about them? They been coming back and forth since last year!
Not a ‘jolly’ to see family nit seenfor which will be almost Two years! Not private flights for students!
Well, my sister is from Ukraine just flew to Miami via Turkey. My in-laws flew to Miami from Spain. Friends flew to Miami from Russia. All have tourist visas.
Does restriction apply to the UK only?
UK, Ireland, the EU Schengen area, Brazil and South Africa. So not sure how your in laws from Spain managed that. But if you are in the UK can get back from the UK via the States via a circuitous route.
The restrictions apply to all Schengen countries.
I’m surprised they could fly in from Spain?
France will accept vaccinated/negative pcr American tourist from 9th June so things might start “moving forward” from mid June..
Apart from here!!
It’s the quarantine in cayman that is ridiculous. If one is vaccinated, there is absolutely no need to quarantine for any length of time.
But not currently back again, as travel to the US from the UK is currently banned unless you are a US citizen.
Well, those ‘ghost flights’ may also be limited and impossible to plan as no July or August schedule has yet to be provided. Having to transit via the US also may make a very big difference in terms of quarantine If Cayman does/had make the green list in June. Also as Cayman is a BOT I don’t think it’s unreasonable for persons to expect at least one a week a flight between the island and its motherland as a minimum. Certainly when these flights were already so heavily booked and there was is a major desire.
The problem is not the bookings. The demand is obviously there and BA want to put the flights on. The problem is CIG only allowing 1 BA flight a fortnight. Presumably because they cant handle the volume of quarantine passengers. Which of course would be massively decreased if they allowed vaccinated , PCR tested passengers free entry like BVI, but that would require some cojones for a politician.
The government is doing no such thing. Stop making up crap.
The Governor has repeatedly said that these flights are organized through his office and he has said that he is trying his best with BA to operate more flights.
These flights were never intended for you and your family to fly off for summer vacation. It was for essential travel only and for getting our students back and forth. It is you that has caused the problem not the CIG.
BA is a private business, owned by a Spanish company and only operates to make a profit. The UK government has zero interest in maintaining travel links with BOTs. Are there any direct flights to BVIs, Turks & Caicos, Anguilla, Montserrat, St Helena, etc, etc? No, because there’s not enough demand to generate a profit.
Yes and its coming back that’s the problem. You can’t fly to the US, even in transit, unless you are a valid US resident.
Stay away! If you needed to leave so bad, wait until we feel it is safe enough to welcome you back!!
The level of ignorance here sometimes is mind blowing
Seen your family recently?
Go away. No need for people who only can think of themselves here. Go away and don’t come back.
Yes but NOT back unfortunately.the USA doesn’t allow travellers from the U.K. at the moment..
But they can’t get back via Miami.
Stay away! If you needed to leave so bad, wait until we feel it is safe enough to welcome you back!!
Parrot, parrot, parrot…
You can’t get back that way though as the US still restricts non-US citizens, so that’s not an option for most.
Stay away! If you needed to leave so bad, wait until we feel it is safe enough to welcome you back!!
Plus, Cayman Airways has not released a schedule for the summer flights to Miami so we can’t book to go via Miami to Europe.
Feels like we are the cage animals in a zoo.
Feels like we are protected babies in a womb. Think you need to go and stay away. We from here are happy cocooned….
No we aren’t…. Why don’t you go hide under your bed and let the rest of us get on with life.
Some of us have grown up and will be cocooned when dead!
12.38pm Add to that, the current zookeepers have no idea how to look after their animals.
I found return flights for Sept at $2204 for economy, just imagine what business fares will cost, only affordable by our new ministers travelling at Govt expense.
Of course – BA know they can charge what they like as they are the only carrier flying from Europe and travel via the US is not permitted at the moment. They have got you over a barrel, as they say.
It’s like Groundhog Day….another day without a plan from CIG! 🤬
My son is at University and BA cancelled his July flight from the UK this week. There are NO flights available unless you wish to spend over $3,500 and then only in August! How can you tell an 18 year old they are not coming home for the summer?
CI government are at fault here for not working with BA to add sufficient flights to meet demand. It’s getting ridiculous that there are many people wishing to travel for valid reasons and CI government are the people denying BA flights AND at the same time saying that they are in discussions with BA. How can this be, unless they are not competent to organise this properly? It’s not exactly a surprise that schools and universities finish in July and that additional flights were needed. They have known this since Covid started!
With 65% of our population vaccinated and over 60 million doses given in the UK, it’s time we moved to the next phase. If you have been fully vaccinated you should be able to travel without our government getting in the way. It’s really that simple. They need to stop trying to control everything.
Let’s see if BA run any flights further flights at all beyond September if tourism doesn’t re-start and they’re no longer being subsidised to transport vaccines. They are in a bad state financially and cutting routes left, right and centre just now.
Hi princess. Sorry your little star darling you wanted out of your life so you could wine dine and brunch all year needs to come “home”. Perhaps you could go back to your homeland and let them day school… or would that cramp your style…. live on an island, either keep the kids here and give them a pretty damn good education, or send them away to your homeland and suck it up when a global pandemic solely aimed at inconveniencing you springs up. One big boat. We are all suffering. Apparently the storm in your little teacup is a little more testy.
Pretty damn good education? Which one of Cayman’s great Universities would that be then. LOL
University dummy.
Hi Mr Troll. Unfortunately all your facts are wrong including my gender! My son was born here, so coming home is really coming home and the reason why he is at university in the UK is that he is studying one of the sciences, something Cayman is not known for.
You may find it acceptable to be cut off from the world, but those of us who actually live in the real one understand you need to keep the links to it open!
This is about the complete lack of planning from CIG. It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to figure out that you need more airlift to move people around at specific times of year (end of academic years are a good example). If CIG put themselves in the middle of commercial issues, like aviation, then they need to step up and start managing it. Otherwise they should just get out of the way and open the borders. We now have two thirds of the total population vaccinated.
What a typical Colonialist attitude!
Get a life. Nobody is cutting your child off from the world. You choose to send him there. I kept mine home for a year because I cared about his health and safety and knowing that if anything happened to him I wouldn’t be able to forgive myself particularly if I couldn’t get to him.
Many of us parents have had to make sacrifices and make do with what resources we have. In order to get my son home last year, a group of us parents got together and did a charter flight to get our students back from Canada. We never once demanded that the CIG force Air Canada or West Jet to fly our children home.
We are privileged to live on this beautiful island and we love all of its benefits but we must understand that the government cannot and should not have to be at our whim and call.
I sympathize with you about getting your child home for the summer and I am sure he wants to come home too but your attitude and manner about that clearly stems from being privileged and having things always go your way. That my friend, changed when the pandemic hit us. My suggestion to you is rather than being so insulting that you try to find alternatives for your son to get home or hope and pray that the government can get Ba to operate some extra flights.
Charter flight? LOL Not under privileged then.
You are an ass.Everyone one chipped in to pay for the flight. I didn’t book my son on a flight that I knew had a slim chance of even operating..Everyone was warned that the airlines were putting these ghost flights and not to book them or do so at your own risk…American still have theirs in for the entire summer but do you see anybody booking them?
Yes it was expensive for me and it would have been far more expensive if we parents didn’t get together and find a solution. I did not sit around and bitch and mona that Air Canada and West Jet had cancelled their flight. We sucked it up and did the best thing for our kids safety and health. We never expected the CIG to bring home my son on the cheap by ordering an airline to operate with cheap seats during the height of a pandemic.
Get a grip.For an entire year you have left your son in one of the worst places in the world for covi so obviously it is just about the money for you..and now the world must change for you because of your moaning and whining and blame game foolishness. I just hope the apple doesn’t fall too close to the tree and your entitled and privileged ways are not followed by your son.
Stop complaining and blaming everyone. Look for solutions, these aren’t normal times.
You sound fun. Bet you get invited to all the parties.
True “crab in a bucket” mentality.
Disgusting response.
The problem is that everyone is using these flights for their normal summer vacations which they are not supposed to do. The reason the students can’t get here is because all of these people that take the summer off to go to the UK or France have booked up all the seats. It is ridiculous that people can’t understand that these are repatriation flights not scheduled normal commercial flights..There is a big difference.
What the new government needs to understand (and to be told in the frankest, plainest terms, as they seem unable or unwilling to comprehend) is that continued closed borders not only threaten any recovery in the tourism industry but is now also a serious threat to the financial services industry. Financial services kept Cayman functioning for the past year, but the situation is now ridiculous. Professionals in that industry have want to leave, and they will take business with them to other jurisdictions. Vaccines have been available to anyone who wants them for some time, and CIG has (and has had) both the resources and the time to address any community spread that might reoccur.
Open. The. Borders. Now.
Or face crashing the financial services industry, pushing the real estate industry (and real estate asset prices) into recession, and killing any hope whatsoever of rebooting the tourism industry.
Thousands of Caymanian jobs, businesses and families are now threatened by CIG keeping its head stuck in the sand.
Crashing financial services industry, good one. 😀
People may not want to hear this or care but it is true. I’m tired of this. Everyone in grateful that we have been in a safe environment for the duration of this pandemic and was willing to make sacrifices to keep it that way until vaccines became available. Now it seems that unlike the rest of the world, vaccines are not enough and we are going to remain locked up.
The worst part is the complete lack of a plan. Everyone understands that this is an evolving situation and things could change but they should be able come up with something. What will reopening look like if we get to 70% What if we don’t? Estimates on time? Or is the plan just to remain closed? Whatever it is, Panton should be telling us. His silence is a disgrace. Maybe he’s worried that he won’t be able to keep his government together if he makes a decision.
People are starting to wonder if they should just leave and good luck getting new people when they realize that they will have to endure a ridiculous ten day quarantine every time they need to leave the island for the foreseeable future.
No one is saying throw open the border but come up with a plan to allow vaccinated people to travel. We are watching the world open up while we are still locked down despite having one of the highest vaccination rates in the world. It’s not going to get much better.
Please. Leave. Send no whiners.
You first. Then we will stay.
Its not just about keeping the financial services professionals happy. Its about the ability to make business trips, to execute on business and develop client contacts. That wasn’t a problem, as long as the rest of the world was also locked down, but as our competitors and client jurisdictions open, its becoming an increasing problem.
You write that on the day that France, Germany and Austria have effectively closed their borders to the UK.
Well said
You have forgotten to add that import duties as a result of construction project also injected considerable income
And what is driving that construction do you think? Do you think that demand for new houses is sustainable if high net wealth individuals have to quarantine every time they come in, or the financial services industry will continue to grow when their professionals and clients cant travel but our competitors can?
They’re coming in and they aren’t leaving.
Indeed.
Financial services industry support every part of the economy – retail, construction, real estate, utilities, civil service & public sector, government income. The government is risking the livelihoods and future of Caymanians across the Islands, across industries, across age groups, in both the public and private sector.
Borders need to open now. Panton’s silence, as others have noted, is an utter disgrace and he should be removed as premier immediately and permanently.
Lol! Knee-jerk much
It is becoming more and more apparent, that the CI will only open up after all of those that are afraid of the Corona virus have died off by other causes.
Look to Barbados and see how it’s done,regular flights, tourists coming back. Safe and sensible plan. Fully vaccinated get rapid test on arrival and maybe one day quarantine whilst waiting for result, but most are back within hours. Then off you go enjoy your holiday /vacation. Simple really.
7:35 am I think I wrote the same exact post last July.
BVI has that too. Good for them.
Can the Government please give us a clue about when exactly they plan to open the border to even limited commercial air traffic. We’ve had 2 BA trips cancelled to see family and have to get our kids back to school in Canada in August. What’s the plan!
Assume your kids werent planning to fly to Canada via the UK. 2 flights a week to Miami, no shortage of flight Miami to Canada.
2 flights a week to Miami, no shortage of flights to the UK..
Cayman islands should allow itself to be ready for disappointment. Island leadership are too afraid of Gods possible retribution to be subjected to any form of personal risk at your expense. The island will open when they feel safe again. Plan accordingly.
I called Travel Time to ask for advice when I read the explore website. The advice was that there were absolutely zero future confirmed flights. None. So I took a chance with the bookings on BA and have now been stung.
The WHO has discouraged traveling. This vaccine is not the silver bullet. This virus has mutated and is spreading like wildfire.
Oh please.
Really get back in your box.
6:43…..so don’t travel. The rest of us that are vaccinated want to!
Even the CDC (who previously advocated for wearing 3 masks! 🙄) has declared it safe for vaccinated people to get out and about UNmasked. Travel is picking up immensely but we’re missing out!
Go. Leave. Don’t come back.
Positivity rate is WAY down! Transmission rate is WAY down! Hospitalization rate is WAY down! Death rate is WAY down.
May be down, WAYYY DOWN, but dying once is too much for me… just sayin…
Well then get vaccinated….
It is not spreading like wildfire in countries where more than 50% have been vaccinated.
yeah the WHO have done a great job. I’d rather take Roger Daltrey’s advice
No need for a quarantine if one is vaccinated! Get with the rest of the world! Open up. This has gone on too long!
Cancelled all plans to come back to Cayman anytime soon. Off to Barbados who are welcoming back tourists with a sensible plan and are opening up and not stuck in a malaise of indecision and lack of planning seen from the Cayman Government.
Cool. Enjoy!
I had july 29 out to uk and august 30 back to cayman booked… now they just cancelled my return only, but all other return flights in July to September full. I know lots of people who just had their gcm to Lhr leg cancelled but not the lhr to gcm flight. I
Booked for 700 usd return day before I knew Boris would announce traffic light system, know some people who paid 3 times that last week – but obviously BA allow credit or free changes to 2023 on all tickets now. Stupid thing is all flights were full but now they have moved weekly schedule to two-weekly, most people have only one leg not cancelled so likely can’t travel. That and the fact it’s clear from the revised schedule that we are not opening up until after September at the earliest, due to the pathetic people who are too lazy to go to the airport and get a free Pfizer jab.
Sorry to hear your hardship, but BA will refund you. Call them on 1 877 767 7970.
refund takes 3 months
No it doesn’t. I’ve had one immediate refund (3 days to see it on my credit card) when they cancelled & immediate vouchers when I cancelled on BA.
I received my full refund from BA within five days.
Under EU/261 regulations, BA is obliged to get you to your destination if they cancel your flight, and it’s their problem, not yours, how they manage that. It’s the law, look it up. You can lodge a case in the small claims court or via CEDR – these are being conducted by email and phone now so you don’t have to appear in person.
Until 24 May (two days ago) the government had ONE flight on its travel portal – 2 June. No flights other than that. They were telling us to wait to book. ONE WEEK BEFORE that flight Travel Cayman is saying don’t book a “ghost flight” Who, in the history of commercial flying has waited until a week before travel to book flights. Forget all the additional paperwork and testing that we are now required to do which requires a great deal of pre-planning. There are many, many students, school, university and other, who are studying in the UK and have had the additional stresses of worrying how they are going to get home. Yesterday half of the BA once weekly flights were cancelled to tally with the Government’s new schedule, which we are told is still subject to change. WTAF? Cayman Government. Enough with the repatriation flights. Open the borders, reduce quarantine. Sort this mess out and let’s move on. if you think COVID is magically going to disappear in a few months you are dead wrong. We will have at least another year of this and we cannot keep our borders closed for ever!
They have Sept 22nd/23rd listed but BA doesn’t have that on their schedule. SMH.
We need more than 2 BA flights every month through the summer.
Bermuda similar size population to here, with local/expat mix & BA flying there twice a week!!!
not concerned too much about the poor little rich kids….
but its plain to see there is no re-opening plan in place for cayman and to call these re-patriation flights is an outright lie and fraud…..
cayman kind
Your first sentence is pure ignorance.
Your second sentence is spot on.
Quite a contrast. Impressive feat.
Not too worried about the poor little poor kids either
We need those poor little rich kids to get an education, preferably in math and statistics, return to Cayman, and run for politics. Then perhaps our government would be so fear based. For three decades I’ve heard the repeated false promises about our public schools. At least no one is currently arguing public school education is based on the quality of the building.
How long now JuJu been voted back in… Do something about that!
This shouldn’t just be about BA flights. It is time to start working towards reopening. Do it with care, thoughtfulness and in phases – but do it. This has all gone on long enough and a few more vaccinated residents, while it would be a good thing, will not make a huge difference at this point. Students are stuck all over (and not just in the UK – there have been NO direct commercial flights to Canada for over a year) and the costs of staying locked down are beginning to outweigh the benefits for the island’s industries and residents.
Exactly!! Its “all about the UK”. Can we PLEASE get direct flights to Canada again!
And to the US!
And New Zealand
And to Azerbaijan.
Like miami maybe. lol…
No, eh.
July and August flights from GCM to LHR are fully sold out, except for a couple business class seats on each of the two August flights (at over $5,000).
BA has a lot of idle long-range planes and would undoubtedly be happy to fly more Speedbirds here if the government would allow. (I factually know the “phantom” July 8th flight was nearly fully booked).
(All BA did was change the flight from every two weeks to every week for the summer. These only recently appeared on their website so everyone assumed that these were added for the summer because of volume, as twice a month does not suffice).
Maybe I’m just not connecting the dots, but given this information, what’s the point of Cayman lobbying the UK to get put on the green list? Why would the UK put us on the green list when there’s so much uncertainty around summer (holiday season) flights and still a 10-day quarantine in place, regardless of vaccination status?
I get that the government is new, but radio silence doesn’t exactly seem to uphold accountability or transparency.
I know that Kenny isn’t the sharpest tool in the box, but this is a whole new level of stupidity- ‘people shouldn’t book flights until we approve them, even though by that stage there won’t be any seats left’. Brilliant.
That’s before we even get onto the fact that once again there appears to be no credible plan at all for reopening. The.vaccine is literally all that there is available to deal with Covid. If that isn’t enough, what else are we waiting for? Would be nice if the government had the courtesy to tell us.
I was willing to give Kenneth Bryan a chance and the benefit of the doubt about his experience….but I am losing faith quickly.
Do you mean his lack of experience in Gov’t or his great depth of experience with the legal system?
The tourism minister is sympathetic to stranded students and caymanians in the UK unable to get flights home due to the lack,of planning by government. Maybe he could hold off visiting the brac and focus on re-opening grand cayman to commercial flights so that stranded caymanians can get home. The current situation is ridiculous with British airways, people have booked advertised flights that government has now told British airways to cancel and only allowing one flight every two weeks. How do you think students and parents are expected to start university or school when all flights are full. We got vaccinated so that the country could open up and we could travel more freely again. How do you think the vaccine booster shots are going to go next time seeing as we are currently vaccinated and were sick for days but nothing has changed for us. It’s time to open up and stop this insanity.
Agree. Joke that they cancelled the weekly flights, I now have one back but outbound cancelled. Need to get off this rock and had planned a European holiday and want to see my family in the UK. At least booking is at no risk as BA guarantee unlimited free changes until 2023. Just open a normal schedule and like in the uk and Europe, only vaccinated people can travel. The flights will be full of fully vaccinated people only and safe. That is what the rest of the world are doing – why have the government reduced the number of flights when the weekly ones were already 100% booked all summer?
Because they have no plans to get rid of the quarantine for vaccinated people and they are unable to monitor that many people. It’s ridiculous that vaccinated people are being subjected to this.
Every single word you said!!
It’s not unreasonable to expect some kind of plan going forward as we are almost at the fabled 70% vaccinated.
It will be 2 years this summer since I have seen my family.
They are vaccinating people in their 30s this week in the U.K.
Both vaccines have now been proven to be effective against the Indian variant.
I am very grateful for how safe we have been the last 16 months but we cannot carry on like that.
I am not talking about letting 1000s of tourists in.I am talking about letting more airlines like AA coming in one or twice a week and have a weekly BA flight that doesn’t need approval!!
Especially when the approval usually comes in 9 or 10 days before the actual.How can you plan such a big trip with literally just over a week’s notice?
More regular flights will also mean the prices will also go down..I hear of people having to pay almost 3500 dollars to get their child home from university.it is an obscene amount of money!
And don’t say it is BA’s fault.They operate a business.if there’s high demand for very few seats then of course the price will go up.
We have done everything CIG has asked of us and being very compliant since last March but I am so fed up of the goalpost moving ALL THE TIME!!
If you are in the financial services sector- maybe you could petition your business leaders to send a message over to the CIG. Say, something like this:
We are having issues due to the Cayman Islands travel restrictions. These issues are limiting our ability to travel for business interests. Additionally, our employees and their families are unable to travel for personal reasons. The continued travel restrictions are making staffing problems for our company as no one wishes to work where they are not free to come and go. If these travel restrictions are not lifted in the next month then our business will make plans to move to a location where travel is not restricted. Thank you CIG, and have a nice day.
_________
XXXOOO
Not a single economy class seat available from GCM to LHR In August. Kids at uni are stressed and many do not want to book a flight to Cayman for the summer if they cannot get back in August.
That’s a terrible position to be in! So many of them count on coming home for summer to work to get enough money to get them through the next school year.
Maybe they stay there and try working in the real world… or is princess not ready for that yet??
I feel bad for Caymanians trying to get to/from university in UK. Glad I am not in that position.
BA does not have a flight on its website for Sept 22nd. Is it any wonder people are angry & confused when they are trying to get their students home &/or trying to visit family that many have not seen for more than a year.
Repatriation flights till September? No good.
Time to open borders!
It is time to allow unlimited commercial flights back!
Tear down the iron curtain, keep 5 day quarantine in place for those vaccinated, but allow freedom of movement.
It is a basic human right!
PACT government, we elected you to be transparent and put Caymanians first, you must help us and restore our freedoms!
No freaking quarantines for vaccinated! Cayman officially has gone bonkers. Unprecedented in a history of humanity.
Yes to your first paragraph
No to 5 days quarantine
Really disappointed with the lack of communication from the new government.