Samoa to Revive its International Jet Services in 2026

Apia, Samoa – 18 November 2025 – The Samoan government is targeting to revive Samoa Airways international jet services before the end of 2026.

The Prime Minister Laaulialemalietoa announced yesterday that while on medical leave in New Zealand, he met with Samoan pilots and aircraft maintenance engineers working overseas and who compiled a report and their advice and recommendations to government on the new venture.

“They are advising on critical issues such as the right type of aircraft suitable for our routes,” said the Prime Minister.

Laauli said that the target is the main destinations such as New Zealand, Australia, Fiji and the United States and it’s a matter of identifying the routes connecting major cities in these destinations to serve our peoples travel needs, tourism and trade markets.

The Prime Minister said the full report will be given to the Minister in charge of the airline and indicated there is the need for two aircrafts to start off with.

Many of the Samoan pilots and engineers moved to work overseas after the jet flights were closed in 2020, but Laauli said these pilots and engineers have indicated their willingness to return home to work when the airline revives its jets services.

Before it closed, the airline had been under financial stress for many years and borrowed $50m from UTOS to lease an aircraft to continue its international flights in 2020. However, the aircraft made it to as far as Australia and never landed in Samoa, when the FAST government decided to return it and focused on paying the airlines debts.

The market has since been dominated by Air New Zealand, Qantas and Fiji Air as the public calls to restore the jet services to provide competition in one of the worlds’ most expensive routes between Apia and Auckland.

The Prime Minister said yesterday that the time is right to revive the airline.

“We are ready,” Laauli told the media.

Reviving the Airline is one of the FAST Governments election promises and it plans to open the airline business to investments from Samoans both local and the diaspora.

Laauli said that there has already been a lot of interest from overseas Samoans in the idea.

He emphasized that the new venture will strictly be run as a business “no more free travel as why we folded last time,” he said.

Since terminating its jet operations, Samoa Airways had been concentrating on flights to American Samoa using Twin Otters and posted a provisional profit after tax of $11 million for the year ending 30 June 2025.