Pago Pago, AMERICAN SAMOA — Amid preparations to resume flights at the Fagalii airport on Tuesday, airlines flying the Apia–Pago route have increased their airfares. The Samoa Observer reported on the increase in its Monday edition. However, Talofa Airways in Pago has told Samoa News that they will not be flying out of Fagali’i Airport due to their concerns with the landing strip.

According to the Observer, passengers hoping to fly private-owned Talofa Airways to the U.S. territory, will have to pay an increased airfare of SAT $767 up from SAT $676 for a return ticket including airport tax, which passengers have being paying separately, but is now included in the ticket.

Airfares charged by the state-owned Samoa Airways have also increased from SAT $822 to SAT $835 for a return ticket while a one-way ticket will increase from SAT $420 to SAT $492. The airline’s tickets have always included the airport tax, unlike Talofa Airways tickets.

(The exchange rate of SAT to US is $2.71, as of June 26th, however US $2.50 is the usual rate used by the private sector — meaning that a Talofa Airways round trip ticket is around US $306, while the Samoa Airways round trip ticket is around US $334.)

The Observer reported that the Samoa's Minister of Public Enterprises, Leatinuu Wayne Fong explained while speaking on the EFKS Soalepule televised program that the increase in airfares is reasonable with the shifting of operations to Fagalii, as it incurred a cost for both airlines and the Samoa Airport Authority.

Samoa Airport Authority (SAA) General Manager, Silimanai Ueta Solomona confirmed that the flights will be operational by Tuesday (Monday) this week following the receipt of the Certificate of the Aerodrome from the authority two weeks ago.

"Samoa Airways has confirmed that flights will start next Tuesday (Monday) and we received the certificate last week Saturday," he said. Samoa News points out that he does not mention that Talofa Airways has confirmed it will also be flying out of Fagali’i.

The increase in the Talofa Airways airfare then seems to be more tied to it now charging the airport tax directly to the passenger, which was not the case previously. The airport tax is SAT $65 and will be paid to the Samoa Government by the airline. However, there is still a SAT $26 increase in Talofa Airways’ tickets to Pago, even though it will continue to fly out of Faleolo International Airport.

In comparison, the Samoa Airways increase is SAT $13 for round trip tickets and SAT $72 for a one-way ticket, and the airline will be flying out of both airports. This is due to Samoa Airways saying they won’t be landing any flights at Fagalii Airport on Sundays — coming or going.

They told Samoa News that this means flights going to Samoa from Pago on a Saturday, which is Sunday in Samoa, will be landing at Faleolo International Airport, and Sunday flights from Apia will be from Faleolo, landing Saturday here in the territory.

In the meantime, both airlines' flights are said to be fully booked this week ahead of the resumption of the much-anticipated service at Fagalii airport, scheduled to begin Tuesday, June 27, Samoa time, the Observer reported. This means Samoa Airways’ Fagalii airport service began yesterday, American Samoa time