The Bahamian economy will be impacted “across the board” if deficiencies in its aviation safety regime are not rapidly addressed, top industry executives warned yesterday, with airline expansion plans and a proposed Aircraft Registry having to be placed on hold.
Reacting to Tribune Business’s exclusive revelation that the Bahamas had the worst aviation safety regime in the entire Americas’ region, Captain Randy Butler, Sky Bahamas’ chief executive and president, said this nation had effectively been “named and shamed” by global watchdogs.
He emphasised, though, that the Bahamian aviation industry was safe – the problem being not the industry’s safety record, but rather the lack of an oversight regime to govern this.
And Llewellyn Boyer-Cartwright, the Callenders & Co attorney and partner, warned that if the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) downgraded the Bahamas from a Category One to Category Two status following its upcoming May 13 inspection, the economic impact would be “immediate”.
