The Federal Aviation Administration is extending its ban on U.S. jetliners flying into Haiti’s capital until September.
The ban, first imposed in November after armed gangs opened fired on three U.S. commercial airlines flying over Port-au-Prince’s Toussaint Louverture International Airport, was set to expire on Wednesday. The FAA is now extending that until at least Sept. 8.
While U.S. air carriers, including cargo and commercial flights, can fly over Port-au-Prince’s air space, they are prohibited from landing at the airport without prior authorization from the FAA administrator, an agency notice warns. The ban also applies to the island of La Gonave. The ban does not apply to people operating U.S.-registered aircraft for a foreign carrier. That distinction has allowed Haiti’s only locally-owned carrier, Sunrise Airways, to continue to operate the only direct flights between Haiti and Miami International Airport using a U.S. charter company.
The FAA’s ban has essentially led to a shutdown of Haiti’s air operations, even though the main international airport is technically open. No domestic flights are operating, and with the exception of a few missionary flights, U.S. military aircraft bringing in supplies for the Kenya-led security forces and the occasional charter from other countries, there hasn’t been much activity.
To depart the country, people have to fly out of the smaller international airport in Cap-Haïtien, which requires travelers to risk their lives on gang-controlled or dangerous mountain roads. Those with deep pockets can pay $2,500 for a one-way seat on a private helicopter. Others either rely on a United Nations helicopter, which is routinely short of funds to move aid staffers, or a chopper paid for by the government of Taiwan. The chopper, chartered by one-time Prime Minister Garry Conille to move police officers, has become the main mode of transport for government officials and their contacts needing to fly out of the capital.
Last week, Jetblue Airways, one of the three U.S. carriers that reported being hit by gang gunfire in November, announced that it was extending its suspension of flights between Port-au-Prince and JFK International Airport in New York and Fort Lauderdale-Hollywood International Airport until at least June. American Airlines, which operated the only daily flights out of Miami, had previously announced that it was indefinitely suspending its Haiti operations and would revisit the decision later this fall. Spirit Airlines, the only carrier to operate flights to both Port-au-Prince and Cap-Haïtien, has not said when it will resume flights to either destination.
The gang violence has displaced more than 1 million Haitians from their homes.
William O’Neill, the U.N.’s independent human rights expert on Haiti, said Tuesday that “the risk of the capital falling under gang control is palpable.”
“These violent criminal groups continue to extend and consolidate their hold even beyond the capital,” added O’Neill, who was in Port-au-Prince last week. “They kill, rape, terrorize, set fire to homes, orphanages, schools, hospitals, places of worship. They recruit children, and they infiltrate all spheres of society. All this with the utmost impunity, and sometimes, as many sources point out, with the complicity of powerful actors.”
In its most recent update on the security situation in Haiti, Osprey Flight Solutions, an aviation risk-management firm, noted that there have been several gang attacks in the capital that increase the security risks. The company’s data indicate that there has been a net gradual deterioration of the security environment in Haiti since September 2022.
“The security environment in Port-au-Prince and its surroundings continues to be highly volatile,” the firm said in a report. “There are high rates of crime, including violent criminal activity, in the surrounding urban areas of Port-au-Prince airport that could affect flight crews while transiting.”
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