Venezuela's National Institute of Civil Aviation (INAC) indicated on Thursday that it expects Colombian airline Wingo and its parent company, Copa Airlines, to resume their flights within 48 hours. Both airlines suspended their itineraries for Thursday and Friday with origin and destination in Caracas due to "intermittencies in one of the navigation signals." "We will maintain monitoring of the airlines that continue their operations in the country, confirming the operability and safety of Venezuelan airspace," INAC stated in a communiqué, published on its Instagram account. Copa and Wingo temporarily canceled their flights to and from Caracas from Panama and Colombia, respectively, after reporting that on Wednesday, their pilots registered "intermittencies in one of the navigation signals," although they emphasized that this situation "in no way compromised operational safety." Also on Thursday, the Venezuelan airline Laser reported that it canceled its trips on the route from Caracas to Madrid and vice versa until December 8 due to "force majeure," after the Spanish Agency for Air Safety (AESA) issued a "high recommendation" to civilian operators not to fly over the South American country. Venezuela is experiencing an air connectivity crisis due to the wave of flight cancellations caused by the advisory issued on November 21 by the U.S. Federal Aviation Administration (FAA), which urged to "exercise extreme caution" when flying over this country and the southern Caribbean due to what it considers "a potentially dangerous situation" in the area. The FAA warning came amid the military deployment ordered by the Donald Trump administration in the Caribbean waters near Venezuela to fight drug trafficking, but that country's government believes it actually seeks to remove Nicolás Maduro from power. In this context, several airlines canceled their flights, and in response, the Ministry of Transport of Venezuela and INAC revoked the flight concession to Iberia, TAP, Avianca, Latam Colombia, Turkish Airlines, Gol, Air Europa, and Plus Ultra.
