Jetair goes bankrupt, but new owner could restart the business
WILLEMSTAD — After Insel Air ceased operations on February 16, 2019, it was replaced by another Curacao-based airline called Jetair. Five years later, on June 18, 2024, Jetair filed for bankruptcy and the Court in First Instance confirmed its status. Both Insel Air and later Jetair were the national airlines of Curacao.
Jetair was founded in 2006 as United Caribbean Airlines and rebranded as Jetair Caribbean in 2019. After the court declared both entities bankrupt, Jetair canceled all flights and the company’s planes were grounded.
The trustees in the bankruptcy, attorneys of HBN Law &Tax reported the possibility of a restart to Minister Ruisandro Cijntje of Economic Development. Media reports suggest that there are several interested buyers on the market. Awaiting the outcome of acquisition talks, the trustees, the government and the director of the Social Insurance Bank have all asked to lift the bankruptcy.
Jetair had already an Air Operators Certificate (AOC) for charter flights. In November 2019 it received its AOC for scheduled flights and the company was recognized as Curacao’s national airline. Antonio Ribeiro (center in the above file photo), the director and owner of Jetair explained the reasons for the downfall of his company in a written statement that was published by Antilliaans Dagblad and Amigoe. Ribeiro founded and managed Curacao Telecom that was acquired by the Digicel Group of companies in 2005.
Ribeiro states that shortly after Jetair received its AOC for scheduled flights, activities came to a standstill due to the COVID-19 crisis. The airline was unable to execute any flights for a period of two years.
In the meantime, its two Fokker-70 planes had to undergo required maintenance controls at a cost of €2.5 million ($2.68 million) while other operational costs continued.
According to Ribeiro two factors contributed to the downfalls of his airline. First of all there is the fact that the American Federal Aviation Authority (FAA) degraded Hato Airport in 2012 from Category 1 to Category 2, because it did not meet all international requirements for flight safety. Because of this, Jetair was banned from flying with its own planes to destinations in the United States.
As the second reason Ribeiro refers to the lack of support from the local government. While the Dutch government supported its national airline KLM with a subsidy of €9 billion ($9.6 billlion), Jetair had to do everything on its own. Even St. Maarten’s airline Winair received subsidies from its government.
Ribeiro acknowledges that, after a lot of begging, Jetair received a modest subsidy from Curaco for a period of eight to nine months. But the subsidy was not even enough to cover the salaries of the airline’s personnel. Ribeiro, who retired fourteen years before he started the airline, was not planning to give up. He kept the company technically out of bankruptcy by putting up his own money, thinking: “The best days of Jetair are still to come.”
But it was not to be. In his statement, Ribeiro apologizes to everyone who suffered damages because of the bankruptcy. “I wanted to do something big for Curacao because this is where I grew up. I ask clients who became the victim of this situation for forgiveness. It was never our intention to benefit from clients who innocently bought their tickets.”
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