Residents in the Cariboo might have to wait until 2021 to fly from the airport.

Quesnel’s commercial flight provider, Central Mountain Air (CMA), released its flight schedule up until Feb. 7, 2021, on its website, with no Cariboo stops listed.

Quesnel Mayor Bob Simpson spoke about the airport closure before the expanded schedule was announced.

“The airport is still there,” he said. “[Council] will be communicating around that. It’s something we will have to have a ‘COVID pivot’ talk on and get together as a council and try to make sense of what’s going on.”

Simpson noted that the airport isn’t just used by CMA. The wildfire base has doubled, private flights are landing, and there is an active flying club.

“The question begged is, that airport is technically built for a regional passenger flight, and if CMA is not coming back — they told us at least not until the end of October — then we have some work to do to figure out what some of our options are there,” he said.

Earlier in August, CMA CEO Bob Cummings said the airline would be taking a “conservative mindset” when deciding which routes to return to.

Central Mountain Air cancelled all flights in April due to COVID-19 and returned on a limited schedule in July.

The airline is still running flights from Prince George, Terrace, Fort St. John and Fort Nelson in northern B.C. A full list of active routes is available at flycma.com.

READ MORE: Flights from Quesnel not cleared for takeoff

READ MORE: COVID-19: Central Mountain Air suspending flights, effective April 11

Quesnel Cariboo Observer