{"id":42828,"date":"2025-08-04T12:38:14","date_gmt":"2025-08-04T12:38:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/42828\/"},"modified":"2025-08-04T12:38:14","modified_gmt":"2025-08-04T12:38:14","slug":"nexus-halts-regional-flights-between-broome-kununurra-and-darwin","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/42828\/","title":{"rendered":"Nexus halts regional flights between Broome, Kununurra and Darwin"},"content":{"rendered":"

An airline linking Western Australia’s Kimberley region with Darwin has announced it will halt flights on the route at the end of August.<\/p>\n

Nexus Airlines is one of two operators flying between the WA towns of Broome and Kununurra, and the Northern Territory capital of Darwin.<\/p>\n

Its presence in recent years, alongside competitor Airnorth, has helped drive competitive rates for customers<\/a>, but there are fears that Nexus’s back-step from the route will result in a price rise.<\/p>\n

In the remote East Kimberley town of Kununurra \u2014 which is closer to Darwin than Perth \u2014 regular and affordable flights are a necessity for many residents, businesses and services.<\/p>\n

But connectivity has historically been a challenge.<\/p>\n

Low numbers and returns<\/p>\n

Nexus managing director Michael McConachy said low passenger numbers were behind the decision to suspend operations between Darwin, Kununurra and Broome, which were not profitable.<\/p>\n

Mr McConachy said competition from Airnorth had been commercially challenging.<\/p>\n

\"A<\/p>\n

Michael McConachy wants the route between the Kimberley and Darwin to be regulated. (ABC Kimberley: Andrew Seabourne)<\/p>\n

“Neither operator are getting great numbers on board or good load factors,” he said.<\/p>\n

“The additional capacity they introduced and aggressive pricing have made it financially unsustainable to continue on this route and, despite Nexus taking a significant share of the market \u2014 ultimately they have deeper pockets.”<\/p>\n

Return to a monopoly<\/p>\n

Airnorth and Nexus have been in a price war since the latter entered the market in mid-2023<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Having a duopoly resulted in lower prices for residents and visitors, with Airnorth’s Kimberley fares dropping significantly, by over a third in many instances<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Mr McConachy said having two airlines operating on the route had also increased the overall number of passengers and services, especially during the traditionally quieter wet season.<\/p>\n

\"An<\/p>\n

Airnorth operates regular public transport routes and charters across northern Australia. (Supplied: Airnorth)<\/p>\n

“The capacity has gone up by, in some instances, over about 300 per cent on the route,” he said.<\/p>\n

“Whilst we’ve seen a definite increase in the number of passengers flying on that route, that’s more in the order of sort of 30 to 40 per cent.<\/p>\n

“The numbers just don’t stack up long-term.”Call for regulation<\/p>\n

The airline’s announcement has triggered concerns prices for travellers may increase.<\/p>\n

Mr McConachy said he would like to see the route regulated.<\/p>\n

On regulated routes, the government steps in to ensure availability and affordability of flights to and from regional locations where demand is marginal.<\/p>\n

“We’ve seen this operate very well in other areas of WA, and I think the Kimberley route is very well suited to that,” Mr McConachy said.<\/p>\n

“That’s really just to protect those that are flying on the service.”<\/p>\n

Shire of Wyndham-East Kimberley president David Menzel said Nexus announcing it was pulling out of the route was sad news.\u00a0<\/p>\n

“It takes out competition from the marketplace, it also takes out that alternate timing of flights,” he said.<\/p>\n

Mr Menzel said it had been wonderful to have two operators and affordable prices on the route, but the actual impact of returning to a monopoly would not be seen straight away.<\/p>\n

“We’ll have to wait to see what the outcome of having one operator is,” he said.<\/p>\n

Mr Menzel said the shire had been concerned for some time that the route was not profitable for two carriers and had been working with the Department of Transport.<\/p>\n

\"Man<\/p>\n

David Menzel says reliable and affordable flights are key to ensuring livability in the remote region.\u00a0 (ABC Kimberley: Giulia Bertoglio)<\/p>\n

“We’ve been asking them as the experts what sort of options there might be to help ensure that our communities got good air services,” he said.<\/p>\n

Mr Menzel said connectivity was a big part of livability for towns as remote as Kununurra, and key to retaining workers and services.<\/p>\n

“We need to keep our communities across the north connected,” he said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"An airline linking Western Australia’s Kimberley region with Darwin has announced it will halt flights on the route…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":42829,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[8170,37622,64,63,24513,99,5249,37630,37625,37626,37623,37628,37629,37627,37624],"class_list":["post-42828","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-business","tag-airlines","tag-airnorth","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-broome","tag-business","tag-darwin","tag-flights","tag-isolation","tag-kununurra","tag-nexus","tag-nexus-cancel","tag-nexus-halt","tag-regional-flights","tag-remote-flights"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/42828","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=42828"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/42828\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/42829"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=42828"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=42828"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=42828"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}