Questions for the Minister of TEATT about the FAA status of the St. Maarten Civil Aviation Authority

Philipsburg — Since the honourable Minister of Transportation, Stuart Johnson, left the Wednesday’s Council of Minister’s press briefing without taking questions from the media, we would like to pose the following questions about the FAA standing of the St. Maarten Civil Aviation Authority (SCAA) to the minister via this medium.

StMaartenNews.com has been reliably informed that the Department of Civil Aviation has submitted a recent report to the Minister with a status update regarding the standing of the St. Maarten Civil Aviation Authority as it pertains to the FAA Category 1 status achievement in the near future.

We would like the minister to answer the following questions:

– Can the minister confirm that there is a report on the status of the SCAA in regards to St. Maarten Civil Aviation Authority obtaining FAA Category 1 status?
– Can the minister give an indication as to the timeline for the St. Maarten Civil Aviation Authority (SCAA) finally obtaining this FAA Category 1 status?
– What are the hurdles, if any, that need to be finalized before SCAA can obtain the desired FAA Category 1 status?
– Will St. Maarten continue its Service Level Agreement (SLA) with Curacao or can St. Maarten continue on its own once the desired FAA status has been achieved?
– Will St. Maarten continue or seek partnerships or SLAs with other Civil Aviation Authorities, such as in The Netherlands and in other Caribbean jurisdictions (such as the French and the Eastern Caribbean Civil Aviation Authority)?
– Can the minister indicate if there are any requests pending for permission from St. Maarten-based airline companies to fly to the USA once FAA Category 1 status has been obtained?

We look forward to the minister’s answers to these questions as soon as possible.

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Related links:
Curacao’s Minister of Aviation on the FAA standing of Curacao’s Department of Civil Aviation