Since President Barack Obama lifted restrictions last year on their visits to Cuba aiming to increase people-to-people contact, they are coming in such numbers that Cuba has had to remodel the airport terminal for US flights.
The immediate beneficiaries are the eight US-based charter services who operate the only flights allowed from the United States and who say business is booming.
The only foreseeable fly in the ointment, they say, is the US government’s inclusion of Cuba in countries where US-bound passengers must undergo extra screening, which Cuba has protested.
The charter companies say direct flights by Cuban Americans to their homeland skyrocketed 70 percent in 2009 and are expected to jump another 36 percent this year.
Cuban officials recently said about 250,000 Cuban exiles visited the island from the United States in 2009 up from an estimated 170,000 the year before, when many found a way around the old restrictions by travelling through third countries.
Obama, who has said he wants better relations with Cuba, lifted restrictions imposed under President George W. Bush that limited Cuban Americans to one visit home every three years.
