TRANS Guyana Airways Ltd. (TGA) has introduced two daily flights between Ogle, East Coast Demerara and Rose Hall in Berbice.

The flights will be on Tuesdays and Thursdays from tomorrow.

The morning flight is scheduled to leave Ogle airstrip at 06:45 hrs and arrive at 07:15 hrs at the renovated Rose Hall airstrip aback of the Guyana Sugar Corporation (GUYSUCO) estate. The return flight is to arrive at Ogle at 08:00 hrs.

In the afternoon the aircraft is to leave Ogle at 15:45 hrs, arrive in Berbice at 16:15 hrs and return to Ogle by 16:45 hrs.

TGA Director, Captain Roy Jainandan told reporters after an inaugural flight to Rose Hall yesterday that the flight schedules are set to accommodate businessmen and others "who would want a full day in Berbice and a full day in Georgetown".

He explained that depending on the volume of business, the airline would increase the frequency of flights.

"We do anticipate if the responses are good, we will continue to put more scheduled flights to service that route more frequently", Jainandan added.

The airline's agent in Berbice is Parsram's Travel Service at Skeldon, Rose Hall and New Amsterdam.

Jainandan said the airline was prompted to start this service because of numerous enquiries and requests for an air service to link Berbice and Demerara.

He said TGA is servicing most if not all interior locations by scheduled service.

"The only area which we are not servicing is Berbice and that is the purpose of the flights", he said.

Jainandan said the airline is launching a promotional campaign until December 15 in which the single fare for an adult will be $4,500 and $8,000 for a return ticket.

He said the airline took over domestic operations after the demise of the Guyana Airways Corporation (GAC) and always wanted to expand these operations.

"We service all the routes which were previously serviced by the now defunct GAC and we have actually expanded on some of those destinations."

"We believe that the Berbice businessmen who value their time, will see the necessity of using that service", he projected.

He said the airline had been toying with the possibility of operating this scheduled flight for some time but had to get approval from GUYSUCO.

"We chose Rose Hall because it is a shorter flying time and we can minimise the cost," he explained.

Jainandan said the major attraction of Rose Hall is that the runway was recently done over 2,000 feet long and 35 feet wide with a concrete surface, compared to the Albion airstrip which has a red brick runway.

Since the hijacking of the airline's Cessna Caravan over the Rupununi last Wednesday, passengers will not be allowed to board any TGA aircraft with their hand luggage, he said.

Hand luggage will be searched at the check-in point, for which the airline will assume responsibility, until the passengers are ready to board the flight, when it will be delivered to them, he said.

"We do have the physical check by our security who are authorised to check the baggage. We will continue to have profiling of the passengers", Jainandan added.

He said all foreign nationals would be required to present travel documents when buying tickets and those documents must be used for travel and at the check-in point.

"We will look at other areas where we can improve on security measures but we do need assistance, and I hope (the) relevant agencies can work along with us to create a desirable and acceptable level of security which will be beneficial to everybody."

"Airport security is a specialised type of security and it is an extremely costly exercise which is not available locally. We will be more than willing to bear the share of the cost but we have limitations", he said.

Jainandan strongly feels that security in general must be dealt with proactively with a coordinated effort with the airlines and government agencies because everyone is at risk.

He said security measures have also been rigidly enforced at the Ogle airstrip with a walk-through metal detector and backup hand scanner.

"I believe at Ogle the security measures are reasonably good. There is room for improvement and once again I believe it will have to be a collaborative effort with the airlines and other agencies involved to strengthen security measures."

"We have our responsibilities and we intend to bear those responsibilities to the fullest", he said.

Since the hijacking, TGA has invested $400,000 for hand scanners which will be on board aircraft and will be used by agents and in the presence of law enforcement officers, he said.

Jainandan said the device can detect weapons on passengers scheduled to board flights.

TGA's 13-seater Cessna Caravan was last Wednesday forced from over the Rupununi to land in Brazil by four men after it left Lethem for Ogle.

The hijackers allowed the aircraft to leave Brazil and the passengers and pilot returned to Ogle by nightfall.