Bangor Daily News

BANGOR -- Just days after one airline officially ended its tenure at Bangor International Airport, another has announced that it will discontinue flights, leaving the municipal airport with fewer options for air travelers.

Delta Air Lines informed BIA this week that as of Dec. 1, 2009, it would stop its twice-daily Bangor-to-Boston service because those flights are no longer profitable. Delta has operated two 50-passenger planes between the New England cities for about two years. Prior to that, a Delta subsidiary offered multiple daily flights on 19-passenger planes from Bangor to Boston.

Assistant Airport Director Tony Caruso said Wednesday that Delta's recent announcement is bad news for the airport but also emblematic of a troubled industry. "We were finally starting to reverse some passenger trends, so this is definitely disappointing," he said.

Already, Continental Airlines has ceased its twice-daily service from BIA to Newark, N.J., leaving the airport with only Delta, US Airways and Allegiant Air.

Delta, which recently completed a merger with Northwest Airlines, has the biggest market share of any carrier in Bangor, accounting for about 50 percent of passengers.

The Atlanta-based company will still continue to offer daily flights from BIA to Detroit and from BIA to JFK International Airport in New York.