Above: a Southwest Airlines plane

By the Caribbean Journal staff

Southwest Airlines is ramping up its Caribbean operations from a major US source market: Houston.

The company announced this week that it had filed applications with the US Department of Transportation requesting approval to serve six new destinations in the Caribbean and Mexico out of Houston’s William P Hobby Airport.

The flights include would include service to Cancun, Costa Rica and Belize, along with service to other destinations in Mexico including Mexico City and Puerto Vallarta.

The service would also represent Southwest’s first flights to Belize, with a Houston-Belize City route.

The company said the expansion was being made possible by the completion of the new $156 million five-gate international concourse at hobby airport.

“We’re building our first-ever international terminal project to give Houstonians, visitors to Houston, and our connecting Customers exceptional value and legendary Customer Service in international markets for which there is great demand,” said Gary Kelly, chairman, CEO and President of Southwest Airlines. “Service to Mexico will be the cornerstone of our international operation at Hobby and the four cities we are announcing today provide exciting travel and business options for consumers.  Adding Belize to the Southwest network and growing our Costa Rica service continues our expansion to international destinations where our People and consumer-friendly policies can deliver as no other airline can.”

Southwest is will launch service from Houston to Aruba on March 7, 2015.