Helping Them Get Home

Sunwing took quick action to repatriate hundreds of Canadian travellers, sending two special, rescue flights to Freeport, Grand Bahama and Nassau yesterday.

The passengers were returned to Toronto and Montreal, escaping the wrath of Hurricane Matthew.

The flights were part of an evacuation plan coordinated by the travel company, which had been tracking Hurricane Matthew over the past week.

In addition to evacuating customers from the Bahamas, Sunwing also relocated numerous passengers in their resort destinations in Cuba that also involved re-routing several flight services to bring customers home earlier.

Holguin, Manzanillo and Camaguey were all placed under hurricane watch earlier this week and the tour operator arranged for customers to be transferred to Cayo Coco out of the anticipated path of the storm; from where flights were re-routed to bring them home.

In addition to assisting customers already on vacation return home, the company was also swift to activate its Hurricane Threat Guarantee assisting passengers due to travel with the option of postponing their trip or selecting a different destination.

The company has also added dedicated services to Cancun from Toronto to provide travellers unable to travel the Bahamas, with an immediate alternative travel option.

Commenting on the efforts, Sunwing’s president of tour operations, Andrew Dawson said: “Coordinating an evacuation on this scale is a major undertaking and we must praise the responsiveness and dedication of both our operations team here in Toronto and our overseas staff based across the region; notably Cuba, The Islands of the Bahamas, Jamaica, Cancun and Aruba, who have all been active in assisting our passengers during this time period. Customer wellbeing remains our paramount concern and we pleased that our clients are now home safely.”

For the latest updates on Hurricane Matthew, go to http://www.sunwing.ca .