Regional airports in Pellston, Sault St. Marie and Alpena will begin offering non-stop flights again starting tomorrow.
In August, SkyWest announced that Delta Airlines would no longer offer direct flights out of northern Michigan’s regional airports to places like Detroit and Minneapolis.
Several state lawmakers urged the U.S. Department of Transportation to intervene, and the decision was soon reversed by SkyWest.
Ryan Bachelor is the director of the Pellston Regional Airport. He said several local organizations came together to bring back non-stop flights as well.
"It's better for all of our travelers, both business and leisure. The schedule facilitates people making their connections in the morning and afternoon banks. I'm just glad that we're back to normal and it was just a brief blip on the radar," said Bachelor.
The shift to flights with multiple stops as opposed to non-stop flights was attributed to the national shortage of commercial pilots. Although Pellston is back to offering non-stop flights, Bachelor said the pilot shortage is still impacting the industry.
"And that's not something that's going to be fixed in the next six months or a year or two even," said Bachelor. "It's an industry wide problem that is going to start with education and expanding the capacity of education facilities to train more pilots."
The shift back to non-stop flights will also impact airports in Escanaba and Iron Mountain.
