A leading airline yesterday delivered a fresh blow to Bermuda after it said it would end its year-round service from New York.

JetBlue, which had flown to Bermuda from NYC 12 months a year, said it would downgrade Bermuda to a “summer seasonal market” later this year.

The announcement came after JetBlue’s Boston service to the island in the winter was phased out in November.

The Boston move was put down to low demand during the off season by Lawrence Scott, the transport minister.

JetBlue’s Boston service to Bermuda is expected to restart in the spring.

The airline’s plan to drop winter service to Bermuda altogether was announced yesterday on the aviation news site Simple Flying.

The loss of the daily JFK service for the off season will cut airlift from another gateway city said to be a crucial market in the National Tourism Plan.

JetBlue’s decision came as the carrier announced big cuts to routes across the US.

A total of 16 services were affected, from domestic destinations such as Raleigh-Durham to the Caribbean and South America.

Other “market adjustments” included dropping the service to Bermuda “in about November” in favour of a shift to Key West, Florida, as the winter seasonal market.

The carrier said it was “continually evaluating our route map to ensure it is aligned with customer demand trends and to help us get back to profitability on a consistent basis”.

The alterations will not entail a permanent end to flights to any of JetBlue’s destinations.

Simple Flying said the carrier had targeted some routes in response to “pandemic travel trends”.

JetBlue added: “As our customers return to more expected booking patterns, these changes will free up aircraft time that we can redeploy into other areas of our network that hold the most strength and relevance to our network strategy in the long term.”