Southwest airlines to begin Cayman flights June 2017

[Drew Sailbum]

...
How's the Zika virus doing there?

There were 30 reported cases of Zika in 2016 in the Cayman Islands. Local transmission of Zika virus was noted in a few of those cases going back to August 2016.

The Mosquito Research Control Unit is reporting positive results from a test release of genetically modified A aegypti mosquitoes. According to this recent article in the Cayman Reporter the MRCU is looking to expand that GM mosquito program island wide to target the vector for Zika, dengue, and chikungunya.

Overall Zika cases are down throughout the Caribbean,

 

[AggieDiver]

If you think SW is a "low cost cattle car" compared to JetBlue, I suspect you haven't flown SW recently. Since they moved to assigning boarding groups by online checkin instead of making you show up early and line up, it is not much different than any other airline except you get to pick your seat as you board. I almost always pay the extra $15 per leg for the "early bird checkin" and almost always end up with an A group boarding number. If you are in A Group, you will have your pick of window or aisle seats and I usually end up in an exit row with more leg room. Getting a low boarding number without the early bird isn't hard either. Just set an alarm on your phone to remind you to checkin 24 hours in advance and you should get a middle B group at worst. What I like most of all about SW though is the customer service and how easy it is if you have to change flights. The flight crews are friendly and act like they are actually happy to see customers on the plane. Since United bought out Continental, their crews seem just one small step below openly hostile towards most customers. That is a real shame because Continental was actually a decent travelling experience before that.

 

[JamesBon92007]

Overall Zika cases are down throughout the Caribbean,

That's good news. There seems to be some inconsistencies: Puerto Rico has over 34,000 locally acquired cases but USVI only has a little over 900. It sounds like local control is working. Either that or they don't report it

 

[Alucard]

Going by your numbers, and adding census data, Puerto Rico has a population of 3.5 million. That would put the infection rate at 0.9% of the population.

The USVI has a population of 104 thousand, which would make the infection rate 2.6%

I would say that they both have problems....

By comparison the population of the Cayman Islands is 58 thousand, which would put the infection rate at 0.05%

I know which one I would choose, if I were concerned about Zika.

 

[AggieDiver]

The Caymans have also always been more active in their mosquito control efforts, so I am sure that is helping slow the spread there.

 

[JamesBon92007]

G
I know which one I would choose, if I were concerned about Zika.

I've avoided Puerto Rico based upon the total numbers but not on the actual percentages just because it sounded worse. If SW would start flying to Hawai'i then I could just worry about dengue instead

 

[AggieDiver]

Looks like SWA has the flights to GCM in their fare search engine now. They still have a note about pending government approval. The daily schedule appears to be 11:45am departure from FLL with a 12:20pm arrival in GCM; and a 1:15pm departure from GCM with a 4:00pm arrival in FLL.

Unfortunately for me, there is no way to get from Houston to FLL early enough to catch that flight to GCM without overnighting in FLL.

 

[JamesBon92007]

Looks like SWA has the flights to GCM in their fare search engine now. They still have a note about pending government approval. The daily schedule appears to be 11:45am departure from FLL with a 12:20pm arrival in GCM; and a 1:15pm departure from GCM with a 4:00pm arrival in FLL.

Unfortunately for me, there is no way to get from Houston to FLL early enough to catch that flight to GCM without overnighting in FLL.

I have a similar situation--To get to Belize City without using LAX I would have to overnight in Houston and book two completely separate flights. If LAX is the only choice I'll go somewhere else or stay home.

 

[AggieDiver]

Yeah, my other choice is to fly United direct. Which isn't terrible, but is usually overpriced. They were much more cost-competitive when Cayman Airways was flying from Houston also.

 

[JamesBon92007]

Yeah, my other choice is to fly United direct. Which isn't terrible, but is usually overpriced. They were much more cost-competitive when Cayman Airways was flying from Houston also.

I'd heard SW was booking flights to Puerto Vallarta and didn't have approval to land there yet. I think they finally got it straightened out so we are checking out hotels there For me it's a fairly short flight but I think one of the trips has a layover in Phoenix which to me is a weird place.