***NOTICE***
As of
September 30, 2007, U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP)
requires that ALL U.S. CITIZENS REGARDLESS OF AGE
have and present a valid US Passport when re-entering the
U.S.
This means that
CBP will no longer accept a receipt indicating that you have
applied for a U.S. passport but have not yet received it,
nor will they accept an expired passport.
Since U.S.
Citizens arriving without proper documentation and the
airline transporting them are both subject to
substantial fines and penalties Island Air Charters
will refuse to board any passenger who does not personally
possess the valid, proper documentation specified for
re-entry.
If you have any questions, please see
the CBP website at
www.cbp.gov
We recommend
that, if you do not have a valid passport, you take the
necessary steps to obtain one sufficiently in advance of
your travel date, as - in response to this requirement - the
time from applying for a passport and actually receiving it
has substantially increased over the usual 10 day to 2 week
period. In this regard, our Passenger Service Agents will
assist you as best they can.
***NOTICE***
Effective
December 30, 2007, all passengers returning to the
United States on Island Air Charters (or any other air
charter carrier, or private aircraft for that matter) with
the intention of continuing on to another destination via
regular commercial airlines should plan on being delayed for
unspecified time periods at U.S. Customs and Border
Protection facilities. These delays will be due to CBP's
implementation and use of their new GR-135 Radiation Isotope
Identifier Device (RIID) Scanning equipment that will be
used to scan all passenger baggage plus the actual aircraft
for illicit radiological and nuclear materials.
While CBP states
in their notice that the new inspection procedure will only
take an additional 5 to 15 minutes depending on the size of
the aircraft, these estimates are - at best - very
optimistic in ideal conditions only.
Passengers
should know that, since CBP agents will only clear one
aircraft, it's passengers and crew at a time, each aircraft
arriving after the first in a progression will be held up an
additional length of time depending upon the speed with
which the CBP agents on duty will be able to accomplish this
additional task.
Remarkably, CPB
installed and implemented the equipment and policy without
hiring or assigning any additional staff to offset the
task! In the mean time, we all suffer the consequences of
that oversight.
Island Air
Charters is currently tracking the amount of time it takes
to clear each inbound aircraft to determine a new "norm" for
clearing Customs. As soon as that new "norm" is known, the
time will be published here, and flight schedules adjusted
accordingly. Until that time, we recommend that inbound
travelers needing to make connecting flights with regular
commercial airlines add an additional hour to their routine
for clearing U.S. Customs.
Where is Island Air Charters?
Island Air Charters' passenger service counters and
executive offices are located in the Sheltair Aviation
Services, formerly known as the Jet Center, physically
located on the west side of Ft. Lauderdale-Hollywood
International Airport in the shadow of the airport's control
tower. For directions, please follow the link to our
Location Page.
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What
documents do I need to travel to the Bahamas?
Regardless of age, all US citizens must have a valid
passport to enter the Bahamas or the United States. No
exceptions. Non-US citizens may travel on an Alien
Registration Card or foreign passport. For more information
concerning travel documents, please follow the link to our
Passenger Information Page.
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How
many passengers can you carry on each flight?
Island Air Charters
currently operates aircraft manufactured by two different
manufacturing companies. One company, a British owned
entity named Britten-Norman manufactures a 10 place
aircraft called the BN-2 Islander. Island Air
Charters operates three of these BN-2 Islanders primarily on
routes to destinations that are less than 120 nautical miles
for the companies Ft. Lauderdale home base. While the
BN-2 Islander comes from the factory with seating for ten,
due to the weight limitations of the aircraft, Island Air
Charters has found it capable of transporting only 7 adults
with minimal baggage, or a combined total weight of less
than 1200 pounds. For these reasons, the aircraft
operated by the company generally have seating for only
seven (7) passengers and one (1) pilot.
The company also operates
aircraft manufactured by Piper Aircraft, an American
aircraft manufacturer, designated as the PA-31-350
Chieftain. The Chieftain is a member of the Navajo
family of aircraft, and has a combination of the largest
fuselage and the most powerful piston engines in the Navajo
production line. Like the Britten-Norman BN-2
Islanders, the Chieftain is a 10 place aircraft.
However the noticeable difference between the two is that
the Chieftain can actually load and transport 10 people
(nine (9) passenger and one (1) pilot) and their respective
baggage, as the Chieftain has a payload of over 2000 pounds.
Island Air Charters generally
dispatches its Chieftain with seating for 7, since the last
row of passenger seats is in an area suitable for the cabin
storage of passenger baggage, however with minimal advance
notice the company will install the 8th and 9th passenger
seats to suit the needs of its customers.
(Also see
Our Aircraft)
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Does my
infant count as a passenger?
No, unless your child is 2 years or older.
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What are your destinations?
Island Air Charters is authorized to fly into and out of
any airport in all countries between Canada (on the North)
and Colombia and Venezuela (on the South), including (but
not limited to) the 48 contiguous United States, Mexico and
all countries in Central America, the Bahamas, Turks and
Caicos, Cuba, Haiti, the Dominican Republic, Puerto Rico,
the Leeward Islands, the Windward Islands and all islands in
the Caribbean Sea.
For a list of
locations that we service on a regular basis see our
Charter Destinations page.
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What is
the Company's cancellation policy?
We understand
that events sometime occur that require our passengers to
either cancel their travel plans with us altogether, or
postpone them to a later date.
However, our
customers need to know and understand that we keep our doors
open by flying our aircraft. Our aircraft do not generate
any revenue whatsoever when they are parked on the ground.
To serve our
customers' needs in this regard, we schedule each aircraft
as efficiently as possible to make them available for every
possible flight that comes up - either scheduled or
charter. And when we schedule an aircraft and a pilot for a
future flight, both the aircraft and the pilot are removed
from availability status and "reserved" for that future
flight.
Since we
receive numerous calls and requests for charters, we either
accept or deny those charters based solely upon aircraft and
flight crew availability, since we simply do not overbook or
double-book our aircraft.
As a result,
Island Air Charters cancellation policy is as follows:
For Cat Cay Yacht Club and
Bimini Private Home Owners
On all
Island Air Charters' scheduled service flights and all
charter flights to either Bimini or Cat Cay - Year Round -
-
For
cancellations, all passengers must give at least 3 days
advance notice to avoid full rate charges;
-
For
all charter cancellations made less than 3 days prior to
a scheduled charter, Island Air Charters reserves the
right to charge the customer full price;
-
For
all single seat cancellations made less than 3 days
prior to an Island Air Charters' scheduled flight,
Island Air Charters reserves the right to charge the
customer full price;
-
Cancellations made more than 3 days prior to scheduled
service flight or a charter flight will net a full
refund or no charge.
-
If a
customer misses a flight or "no shows" Island Air
Charters reserves the right to charge the customer full
price;
-
If a
customer misses a flight, Island Air Charters will allow
travel on the next available flight on the same day only
as a standby passenger and subject to space
availability.
On all
Cat Cay Club sponsored flights -
FOR ALL
AIRCRAFT CHARTERS TO DESTINATIONS OTHER THAN CAT CAY OR
BIMINI
Please note
that the particulars of the charter, such as the price,
departure dates and departure times cannot be guaranteed,
and aircraft will not be reserved until the final payment
has been made. For these reasons we strongly suggest that
payment be made in full at the earliest possible time, and
no less than 30 days in advance of the charter date.
From November
through May we require that a non-refundable deposit
equivalent to 50% of the charter rate be made 90 days in
advance of the charter date with the balance to be paid 30
days in advance of the travel date. This will assure the
charter rate and reserve an aircraft for your travel dates
and times.
For charter
flights cancelled from 60 to 90 days in advance we will
refund 90% of the charter rate.
For charter
flights cancelled from 46 to 60 days in advance we will
refund 75% of the charter rate.
For charter
flights cancelled from 31 to 45 days in advance we will
refund 50% of the charter rate.
For charter
flights cancelled from 16 to 30 days in advance we will
refund 25% of the charter rate.
We will not
refund for charter flights cancelled less than 15 days in
advance.
For all other
months, we require a non-refundable deposit equivalent to
25% of the charter rate be made 30 days in advance with the
balance due 15 days prior to the charter date.
We will not
refund for charter flights cancelled less than 15 days in
advance.
If you
schedule a charter flight with Island Air Charters and
require us to change your departure date and time, Island
Air Charters will do everything within reason to reschedule
that charter flight for a rescheduling fee of 10% of the
charter rate. However, Island Air Charters cannot guarantee
that the rescheduled flight can conform to your exact travel
schedule as the aircraft may be booked on another charter
and the Company must assure advanced charters are serviced
as agreed. In cases such as these, the Company will make a
concerted effort to satisfy your travel requests but simply
cannot guarantee them.
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Why doesn't Island Air Charters use the new Cessna Caravan
Turboprop single-engine airplane on its routes?
The "new"
Cessna Caravan (C-208)
Turboprop aircraft only has one engine. The benefits of
turboprop reliability are lost on an aircraft having only
one engine, because the one prop installed on that one
engine can fail too!
While it is
perfectly legal to - as a private individual - purchase an
aircraft such as the single-engine Cessna Caravan, load up
you friends, your family and all their worldly possessions,
and then fly them all across the open spans of the Gulf
Stream to the Bahamas, Federal Aviation Regulation 135.183
prohibits charter companies such as Island Air Charters,
from operating any single engine aircraft (be it turboprop,
turbojet or piston powered) beyond the power-off glide ratio
distance from any land mass.
What this
regulation means in lay terms is, when [not "if"] that
single engine (or single prop) fails, the pilot must be able
to glide the aircraft - without the engine running - to a
[crash] landing on a dry piece of land. Crashing into the
water, mere feet from the beach surrounding some desolate,
uninhabited island is in violation of the regulation, but
crashing onto the actual beach itself is O.K. (while saying
a crash landing "anywhere" is an acceptable conclusion to
any flight)!
Knowing this,
some charter companies insist on operating their Caravans
across the Gulf Stream (luckily, and for the most part)
without an incident, yet in so doing they risk the lives of
everyone onboard the aircraft (and violate Federal Aviation
Regulations in the process) every time they do so when they
fly at altitudes less than the ever-changing power-off
required glide distance altitude at any given moment, which
in optimum circumstances is no less than 13,000 feet midway
across the Gulf Stream (or higher depending upon the
departure airport, the actual over-water route, the wind and
the weather). Remember here, flying across the Gulf Stream
in a charter Cessna Caravan at an altitude less than 13,000
feet is a deliberate and direct violation of the law!
Island Air
Charters operated a Caravan for a short time, and found it
impossible to operate the aircraft "legally" while complying
with Air Route Traffic Control procedures and instructions
that prevail in the airspace encompassing South Florida.
At any given
moment, an abundance of high-speed jet aircraft are
traversing the airspace from West Palm Beach to the Florida
Keys following prescribed arrival and departure routes.
Routes that literally prevent a slow moving Cessna Caravan
from climbing on an inverse power-off glide ratio "profile"
through them without conflict. To avoid any conflicts
between high-speed jet transports and small, slow-moving
prop aircraft, the air traffic controllers simply keep the
Caravans at lower altitudes. Altitudes that work well for
their aircraft separation purposes, but altitudes that are
coincidentally in violation of FAR 135.183.
This quagmire
and dilemma has been brought to the attention of the local
FAA officials, who freely admit there are charter companies
out there operating Caravans in violation of this
regulation. However those same FAA officials also freely
admit that - since they are understaffed - they are unable
to enforce this regulation at this time, even though each
flight that is performed illegally is subject to a minimum
fine of $25,000.00 and the lives of the travelers are at
risk. So much for air safety!
To skirt the
requirements of that pesky regulation, some charter
companies have equipped their Caravans with floats equipped
with retractable wheels making them truly amphibian
aircraft. Since amphibian aircraft are designed for both
water landings and runway landings, the pilot can legally
take-off from any airport and fly across the open spans of
the Gulf Stream at any altitude the pilot so chooses, and if
the engine or the prop fails, the pilot can make an
emergency water landing (or so the theory goes!).
The part here
that the FAA seems to have overlooked is the fact that,
while a Caravan equipped with floats is designed to operate
into and out of "back country" lakes, rivers and streams, it
is not necessarily equipped or designed to land in the open
ocean. A landing on a calm lake, river or stream should be
uneventful, if not routine for an experienced pilot, but
unfortunately, the chances of surviving a water landing in
seas higher than two feet, are at best, slim and diminish
rapidly as the seas increase above four feet, the typical
good weather seas that prevail off the coast of South
Florida.
For these
reasons, Island Air Charters has found the Cessna Caravan
unsuitable for the type flying it conducts on a daily basis
- flights back and forth across the Gulf Stream.
The Cessna
Caravan is a wonderful aircraft that is operated daily
around the world safely and (for the most part) without
incident. It is a fantastic back country plane, that can
haul a tremendous amount for its size. For all its
attributes though, unfortunately, it still only has one
engine and one prop. That said, if, and when Cessna decides
to manufacture a Caravan with two engines, Island Air
Charters will probably be one of the first to order several.
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