St. Maarten Bans Flights From USA On Day of Reopening

Kashlee KucheranJuly 30, 2020

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Last Updated 3 months ago

Last week the island nation of St. Maarten officially announced its reopening for international tourism with the opening of the Princess Juliana Airport, starting on July 1, 2020.

Originally the tourism minister Ludmila de Weever stated that the country is ready to receive travelers from Europe and North America as of July 1, and had dozens of flights from the USA scheduled to arrive as soon as July 2.

In a surprising move on July 1, the administration of St. Maarten changed course in removing travel restrictions for Americans by barring all flights coming from the USA.

The Princess Juliana Airport did in fact reopen on July 1 for international flights, but made a quick decision to not accept any flights origination from the United States, until at least July 14^,in which the current ban will be reviewed again.

Update July 15:

Flights from the USA are planned and expected to resume August 1, with a disclaimer from the government saying “subject to change”

Update July 30, 2020:

The government of St. Maarten has confirmed that the Princess Juliana Airport will reopen for flights coming from the USA on August 1st.

The last-minute decision to ban flights coming to St. Maarten from the USA was said by st-maarten.com to originate from tensions between the French and Dutch administrations on the island. The French side is an integrated part of France and the European Union, which currently bans all travelers from the United States.

The French side of the island gave the Dutch side an ultimatum stating that if they did indeed accept flights from the USA, then the French side would have to close their borders to the Dutch side. In order to save their relations and important economic ties, the Dutch side made the decision to ban flights from the USA until a July 14 review.

St. Maarten receives a large majority of their tourism revenue from American travelers. Direct flights from over 6 US cities were scheduled to resume to St. Maarten in the first 2 weeks of July, which have now been postponed.

St. Maarten is now open for international tourism with approved flights from Canada, the Caribbean and Europe.