MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

Regional Spanish airline plans flights to Gibraltar

An airline based in the Spanish region of Andalusia, Andalus Lineas Aereas, is planning to restore daily air links between Gibraltar and Madrid as part of an ambitious strategic plan to link regional air routes across Spain and Morocco.

Gibraltar Chronicle reports Andalus will be using an Embrear ERJ-145 aircraft with capacity for 50 persons. Granada, Barcelona, Sevilla, Alicante, Palma de Mallorca, Gerona, Agadir, Fez, Marrakech and Oudka have already been confirmed as destinations by the company while other destinations in Portugal including Oporto and Lisbon have been mentioned. A daily flight between Nador and Malaga commenced this week which also includes Casablanca. A spokesman for the company said negotiations with the Gibraltar Government and the Spanish authorities are at an advanced stage for the Gibraltar route, and expressed confidence that agreement will be reached shortly. The company has its flight headquarters in Malaga and plans further trans-Atlantic expansion with flights to South America and the Caribbean. In related news a travel website (Travel+Leisure) has Gibraltar among the top list of the world's scariest runways that can make even the most relaxed travellers grip their armrest. Gibraltar Airport is described as pinched in by the Mediterranean on its eastern flank and the Bay of Algeciras on its western side, the airport's truncated runway stretches just 6,000 feet and requires pinpoint precision The list includes: 1) Airport, Bhutan; 2) Princess Juliana International Airport, St. Maarten; 3) Reagan National Airport, Washington, D.C; 4) Gibraltar Airport; 5) Satekane Air Strip, Lesotho; 6) Barra Airport, Barra, Scotland; 7) Toncontin Airport, Tegucigalpa, Honduras; 8) John F. Kennedy International Airport, New York; 9) Madeira Airport, Funchal, Madeira and 10) Juancho E. Yrausquin Airport, Saba, Netherlands Antilles. This list is compiled by Travel + Leisure and Reuters can be checked at: (http://www.travelandleisure.com/slideshows/the-worlds-scariest-runways/1).