Court Initiates Judicial Process For Air Calédonie

Wednesday, 15 April 2026, 2:06 pm
Article: RNZ

Patrick Decloitre, Correspondent French Pacific Desk

A Commerce Tribunal in New Caledonia has started a judicially-supervised recovery process for domestic airline Air Calédonie on the verge of bankruptcy.

Faced with a serious financial situation and ongoing blockades of its airports between the capital Nouméa and New Caledonia's outer Loyalty Islands (northeast of the main island), Air Calédonie filed its case for recovery at the end of March 2026.

The protest movement was initiated by groups of angry outer islands customers who intended to oppose the company's decision to move Air Calédonie's operations from the Nouméa Magenta airport to New Caledonia's international La Tontouta base, more than 50km away from Nouméa city.

The smaller airport of Magenta, until now dedicated to domestic traffic, is located closer to Nouméa.

The protest movement started 2 March and has been ongoing since.

It effectively grounded all Air Calédonie aircraft to and from the Loyalty Islands destination.

Another round of talks held over the weekend with the leaders of the blockade collective - on the three Loyalty Islands group of Maré, Lifou and Ouvéa - and French State representatives failed to produce any progress.

The Loyalty "customary" leaders have once again voiced their strong opposition to any other outcome than the return of the flights back to the small airport of Magenta.

The blockade movement has also severely aggravated Air Cal's financial situation with an estimated accumulated loss of over 256 million French Pacific Francs (CFP, around US$2.5m) and about US$100,000 per day, making the company virtually unable to pay its staff in the short term.

Nouméa Commerce Tribunal, which is now effectively in charge of Air Cal's affairs in judicial management mode, has on Tuesday provided a few details as to what the next steps could be.

What the next steps could be

Under the procedure, this could involve approving a salvage plan for the embattled airline, Public Prosecutor Yves Dupas said in a release on Tuesday.

This process was initiated at the company's request following its latest Board meeting on 27 March.

Air Calédonie earlier decided to place about half of its 220 staff on a temporary employment mode and on a part-time pay, as another provisional cost-cutting measure.

A similar measure was already implemented in the wake of the May 2024 post-riots crisis, when some 155 staff were laid off, resulting in savings of about US$10m.

The recent crisis situation was also compounded by the insurrectional riots that broke out in New Caledonia (mainly in the capital Nouméa and its surroundings) starting in May 2024.

The unrest caused 14 deaths and economic damage of over €2 billion.

But it also affected the capacity to operate domestic and international flights out of the airports of Nouméa La Tontouta and New Caledonia's outer islands.

The plan to relocate Air Cal's operations from Magenta to La Tontouta had been mooted by previous governments of New Caledonia, on the basis that if the change of location was not implemented, then the company would not survive.

'Last chance' to survive

Dupas said this was probably the company's "last chance" to survive and to preserve its future.

Under the process, Air Calédonie could be allowed to continue its operations, while at the same time, all of its debts before 14 April 2026 would be "frozen".

The objective was to immediately "preserve" the company's cash flow as part of the company's "continuation of activity" for an initial period of six months, renewable.

It was hoped that under this process, Air Calédonie could eventually "have the means to recover to a sustainable activity level".

As part of its first ruling on that case, the Commerce Tribunal stressed the company's "essential role" and the necessity to maintain New Caledonia essential inter-island links (a notion often referred to as "territorial continuity").

Last month, on 26 March, another affected destination for the inter-island company, the small airports blockade on the Isle of Pines (South off the capital Nouméa) was lifted.

Air Calédonie, in its embryonic form, started operations in the mid-1950s.

It currently operates a fleet of four turbo-prop ATR-72 aircraft.

The main shareholders of Air Calédonie are the government of New Caledonia, as well as its three provinces (North, South and the Loyalty Islands group).

Under the current circumstances and the remaining blockade in the three Loyalty islands, Air Calédonie operates only to the Isle of Pines and the neighbouring island State of Vanuatu.

Due to previous hardships faced recently, including the Covid crisis, which also badly affected inter-islands operations, in October 2025, Air Calédonie also entered into agreements with Air Vanuatu to avail one of its ATR-72 aircraft for the neighbouring archipelago's domestic air links, including to and from the capital Port Vila and Vanuatu's other main islands of Espiritu Santo (North) and Tanna (South).

In September 2024, a Nouméa-Port Vila bi-weekly link was also established under a code share agreement between Air Calédonie and Air Calédonie international.

At the time, the agreement was perceived as one step towards a possible merger of the two entities' domestic and international operations, in a bid to save costs in the face of recent crises.

Air Cal's situation is further compounded by serious technical problems faced by the only other means of inter-island transport: the ferry "Betico", which has also been unable to operate, on a regular basis, over the past few months.

The ship recently underwent major repairs to its engines.

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