Wamena Airport Reopens

Commercial flight services at Wamena Airport, Jayawijaya Regency, Papua will reopen on Thursday, August 13, 2020.

Previously for 14 days commercial flights to Wamena were canceled. The local government only opens commercial flights out of Wamena.

The decision to reopen commercial flights from outside Wamena was made according to the agreement of the forkopimda meeting at the Wamena Autonomous office on Saturday afternoon, August 8 2020.

"Starting Monday, passenger flights will reopen. However, for regular passenger aircraft as scheduled on Monday, they cannot operate, but will start operating on Thursday, ”said Regent of Jayawijaya, Jhon Banua.

According to him, starting from Monday, August 10, 2020, flights from outside specifically chartered aircraft that will enter Wamena are welcome, but regular passenger aircraft will start operating on Thursday, August 13, 2020.

"So the flight is not completely normal, because it is adjusted to the schedule that has been issued previously," he said.

In the previous flight schedule, every Monday, Tuesday, Friday, Saturday specifically for Wing Air, now there is a schedule change to Tuesday and Thursday which is adjusted to aircraft connectivity from Jakarta. As for Trigana Air, it is likely to operate on Monday and Friday.

"The flight is still the same as before, one day or two flights because we have not opened freely and there are still restrictions," he said.

Regent Jhon Banua said, flights that will be opened from outside for a while can only go through Jayapura-Wamena while those from Biak and Timika cannot be opened yet.

He added that the supervision of Covid-19 officers would be added by TNI / Polri members and placed at Sentani Airport as many as 7 people, so that supervision would continue before entering Wamena, which must be Covid-19 free.

"Every passenger who wants to go to Wamena is required to have a rapid test in Sentani, so those who are already rapid in Sentani are not doing another rapid test at Wamena Airport," he explained.