Loading banners
NEWS EXPRESS is Nigeria’s leading online newspaper. Published by Africa’s international award-winning journalist, Mr. Isaac Umunna, NEWS EXPRESS is Nigeria’s first truly professional online daily newspaper. It is published from Lagos, Nigeria’s economic and media hub, and has a provision for occasional special print editions. Thanks to our vast network of sources and dedicated team of professional journalists and contributors spread across Nigeria and overseas, NEWS EXPRESS has become synonymous with newsbreaks and exclusive stories from around the world.
Canadian airliner Air Transat is cancelling its last two flights into Florida as of this spring, suspending all of its business into the United States.
The airline is cancelling its flights to Fort Lauderdale and Orlando for the 2026 summer season, with a gradual end of operations in the spring, spokesperson Marie-Eve Vallières said Thursday. Flights to Orlando from Montreal will end on May 3, along with flights to Fort Lauderdale from Quebec City and Montreal, starting in May and June.
Air Transat previously had as many as two flights a day to Florida.
The decision on whether flights will resume to Florida next fall and winter will be determined at a later date, Vallières said.
She noted the airline’s presence in the U.S. had been marginal, representing only one per cent of Air Transat’s available seat-kilometre capacity for the summer.
Only two of the airline’s 67 destinations are located in the U.S., in Fort Lauderdale and Orlando, favoured destinations for Canada’s snowbirds and those attending theme parks like Walt Disney World.
Earlier this week, Canadian airline WestJet announced it was cutting service to 10 U.S. cities because of a decline in demand. Flights out of Vancouver, Calgary, Edmonton and Winnipeg to destinations including Nashville, Los Angeles, Tampa and San Francisco were being dropped.
“We saw a notable decline in trans-border travel demand throughout 2025,” WestJet spokesperson Julia Kaiser told the Vancouver Sun. She noted there was no indication this trend would change in the future. Demand for Latin American, Caribbean, trans-Atlantic and trans-Pacific destinations remains strong, Kaiser said.
Air Transat said it made the choice in order to make full use of its resources.
“This adjustment is part of a proactive management of our capacity, as we focus our efforts on markets where Air Transat is best positioned and that allow us to optimize the deployment of our resources,” Vallières wrote in an email. (The Montreal Gazette, except headline)
•PHOTO: A traveller walks past an Air Transat logo in departures area at Montreal-Pierre Elliott Trudeau International Airport in Montreal on Dec. 9, 2025. Air Transat will end flights to Orlando from Montreal on May 3, along with flights to Fort Lauderdale from Quebec City and Montreal, starting in May and June. Photo by Christinne Muschi /The Canadian Press
