United Airlines Remains Committed to Guam

By Andrew Curran.

A senior United Airlines manager says the airline will keep its Guam base open even though he doesn’t know when demand on its core Guam – Japan routes will recover.

As reported by Guam’s Daily Post outlet, United’s Senior Manager for Global Network Planning, Anthony Falvo, told the Micronesian chapter of the Pacific Asia Travel Association (PATA) in Yap on October 22, 2025, that the airline was sticking around.

This follows ongoing lacklustre demand from the Japanese and South Korean markets and some speculation about United’s commitment to Guam and the wider Micronesian region.

“United is not going anywhere,” said Falvo, who dialled into the meeting from the United States. “We really want to be the ones to add new flights when the demand does start to materialise.”

Chicago-headquartered United Airlines is the world’s largest airline with over 1,000 aircraft in its fleet, including eleven B737-800s based in Guam that fly to 15 airports across Japan, East Asia, and Micronesia.

Four of those airports are in Japan – Tokyo’s Narita (NRT) and Haneda (HND), Osaka (KIX), and Nagoya (NGO). Currently, United flies between Guam and its Japanese ports around 40 times per week. However, the airline has recently axed the Guam (GUM) – Fukuoka (FUK) route and earlier this year cut its frequencies to Nagoya. Falvo said the Japanese and South Korean markets, which Guam’s tourism sector has historically relied upon, were only at about 50% of their pre-pandemic levels.

“We had to make a decision,” said Falvo. “We (could) operate a smaller base of airplanes out there, or we could do something creative with the aircraft until demand between Japan and the rest of the region recovered, and we choose the latter.”

The latter option included United no longer flying to South Korea from Guam. But it has also seen the airline take advantage of the existing bilateral air services agreement between the United States and Japan to operate fifth freedom flights from Tokyo using Guam-based aircraft.

“This year, we started flying from Tokyo to Mongolia,” Falvo continued. The airline is also starting a nonstop service between Tokyo Narita and Palau (ROR) this week, a service Falvo says “has been a long time coming.”

He says by keeping aircraft in the US territory and employing over 1,000 people across Guam and Micronesia, including flight crews, the airline will be in a “better position to grow as soon as we see the demand we need to see.”

Next year, United will start swapping out its Guam-based B737-800s for B737-8s, along with upgrading its terminal facilities at Guam’s Antonio B. Won Pat International Airport. The airline has also deployed a B777-300ER on its thrice-weekly non-stop round-trips between Guam and Honolulu – part of a longer San Francisco (SFO) – Honolulu – Guam -Honolulu – San Francisco rotation for the US-mainland based B777.

The MAX 8s, which Falvo says will provide a superior passenger experience to the older B737-800s, will operate to all other points served via United’s Guam hub, as well as routes between Tokyo Narita and Cebu (CEB), Ulaanbaatar (UBN), Saipan (SPN), Kaohsiung (KHH), and Palau.

United Airlines’ B737s also fly to Palau, Manila (MNL), Saipan, Yap (YAP), and Taipei (TPE) nonstop from Guam. In addition, United’s Guam-based B737s continue to operate its island hopper service to between the US territory and Honolulu, stopping at Majuro (MAJ), Kwajalein (KWA), Kosrae (KSA), Pohnpei (PNI), and Chuuk (TKK) en route.

While Falvo is keen to stress United’s commitment to Guam and the wider Micronesian area, he said there remained several barriers to growth, including the low number of Japanese passport holders.

“There are surprisingly few people who have passports today in order to leave the country,” he said.

Falvo encouraged the PATA attendees to launch a campaign to encourage Japanese to get a passport and visit Micronesia.

Photo: United Airlines.