Speaking to Lusa agency, Luís Rodrigues said that the company will rent (in a leasing service) an Airbus A330, which will serve "fundamentally" to connect Oakland, California, to the Azorean archipelago.

"The fundamental thing will be to connect Oakland. Depending on the demand that is occurring and, at the moment, a lot of demand is taking place, which is something that is making us very satisfied, it may complement Boston, mainly with Ponta Delgada and Terceira", stated.

Recalling that in recent years SATA has "chartered an aircraft for two months" in the summer to guarantee connections with North America, the president of the SATA group said he has "no doubts" that leasing is the "most profitable solution" for the Azorean company.

"It's about the operation that connects Oakland to Terceira every summer. We don't have a plane to do that. It's too long a route. We could do it by occupying part of the fleet, but it required a technical stop in Toronto. It was expensive", he explained.

Not detailing the values involved in the operation, the president of SATA guaranteed that the 'leasing' "will cost less than the revenue it will generate", being a "normal and peaceful option".

"It is an operation that has been well studied. We considered three options. The most economical and efficient was this one. We did all the calculations that we had to do, with all the assumptions. We have already started to receive pictures of the store in Oakland full of people wanting to buy tickets for the summer".