By Danny Sinopoli The Civil Air Terminal is expected to get a lot busier in the coming months as three new flights -- including a confirmed link to the Caribbean -- prepare to take off.

On Tuesday, Houston-based Continental Airlines announced that it would be adding a second daily connection to Newark in the summer.

The airline, which currently operates a morning flight between Bermuda and New Jersey, will offer a connection that leaves Newark at 12.50 p.m. and arrives on the Island at 4.10 p.m., local spokeswoman Ms Judy Roberts told The Royal Gazette .

She added that the return flight to the US would leave Bermuda at around 5.00 p.m.

Continental's added service -- on a Boeing 727 -- will operate between June 1 and September 5.

In the meantime, German-based Condor Airlines has confirmed to the Tourism Department that it will be providing a direct air link to an unspecified Caribbean island as of November.

That link, Tourism Director Mr. Gary Phillips told The Royal Gazette yesterday, will serve as an added leg to Condor's weekly Frankfurt-Bermuda service, which begins in May.

Condor, a subsidiary of Lufthansa Airlines, will be operating a 269-seat Boeing 767 to and from the busy German airport every Tuesday, Mr. Phillips said.

The flights will leave Frankfurt at 11.50 a.m. and arrive in Bermuda at 3.20 p.m.

They will subsequently leave the Island at 4.50 p.m. and arrive in Germany at 6.00 a.m.

Mr. Phillips, who stressed that the Condor connection was a scheduled flight and not a charter as is frequently reported, said the service would make it easier for Bermudians to travel on to such cities as Hamburg, Munich, Vienna and Zurich.

"It's very convenient,'' Mr. Phillips said. "This flight is hooked into the Lufthansa reservation system, so it can be found on any computer. Any member of the public can buy a ticket.'' The Tourism Director, who characterised Bermudians as "great'' travellers, said he expected "no difficulty'' in terms of Condor's ability to fill seats on its German and Caribbean flights.

Last week, the West Indian Association said it has been trying to secure a direct air link to the Caribbean on the ground that an increasing number of Bermudians were travelling to the region.

And Mr. Phillips, whose department conducted a seminar last week on the expected influx of European visitors, said yesterday that the number of non-British tourists from the continent rose by 10.2 percent in 1994 to 6,800.

The amount of Germans who paid a visit to the Island last year increased by 10.6 percent to 2,900, he added.

Some 2,600 Germans came to Bermuda in 1993.

In other airline news, Mr. Phillips said yesterday that he expected to know by tomorrow if American Airlines would be operating a non-stop flight from Bermuda to Miami.

Tourism Minister the Hon. C.V. (Jim) Woolridge has said that any link to south Florida would depend on whether or not the airline, which recently cancelled its popular service to Raleigh-Durham from the Island, had an available aircraft.

Last week, the Minister also confirmed that Newark-based Kiwi International Airlines had petitioned the US Federal Aviation Administration to provide a direct link to Bermuda from Chicago.

He added that a decision by the FAA was expected in a couple of weeks.

In the fall, Kiwi was voted the "number one'' US airline in a Conde Nast Traveler readers' poll.