Wenatchee’s Pangborn airport hits passenger record in 2018

By Reilly Kneedler / The Wenatchee World

EAST WENATCHEE — Pangborn Memorial Airport saw a record number of passengers pass through its doors in 2018, with a total of 127,563 inbound and outbound travelers.

“We feel really good about it,” said Airport Director Trent Moyers. “There’s been a lot of support from the community to ‘Fly Wenatchee’ and it showed up in those numbers.”

The airport had 64,689 departing passengers, a 7.2 percent increase from 2017, according to a press release Wednesday. Arrival passengers totaled 62,874, up 7.1 percent.

Only 2.7 percent of flights were canceled in 2018, which added to the increased passenger volume. That was largely due to a milder winter and readily available pilots, Moyers said.

“Cancellations have typically been because of weather, or what we saw in 2017, pilot shortage issues,” he said.

Pangborn’s fourth daily flight in the summer and over the holiday season also added to the record numbers. Alaska Airlines has already made plans to bring back the fourth flight this June, Moyers said.

The airport is still pursuing a direct flight to San Francisco and has pitched the route to several airlines. Airport officials hope to have it established by the summer of 2020.