-airline plans to operate by second quarter of 2017

STARTING next month, a new airline under the “Guyana Airways” banner plans to commence hiring staff, a move which is still under discussion, but which has received kudos from the travelling public.
The name Guyana Airways is synonymous with the travelling public here and overseas, since it bears similarities to the Guyana Airways Corporation (GAC) which was the country’s national flag carrier years ago. GAC later went bankrupt and eventually faded, even after successor, Guyana Air 2000 tried to keep the airline afloat.

In mid-2016, a new company under the Facebook name “Guyana Airways Returns 2016,” appeared on social media and several persons welcomed the idea of a new airline which plans to service direct flights along the lucrative Guyana-North American routes, including New York and Miami, using two luxurious Airbus 340 aircraft.
On Saturday, Director-General of the Guyana Civil Aviation Authority (GCAA), Lieutenant-Colonel (Ret’d) Egbert Fields, told the Guyana Chronicle that the company has applied for a meeting with the aviation umbrella body. However, he could not disclose any further information on the subject.

During a press briefing at the Transport Sports Club on Thomas Lands earlier this month, Fields had noted that there were no new airlines engaging the umbrella body. He noted however, that an entity had approached the aviation body and that certain areas needed to be addressed before discussions between the two parties could have proceeded further.
In a recent posting on social media, Guyana Airways reported that the company has been inundated with calls and texts with regard to the start-up date of its flight operation. “We would like to thank you for your interest in our project that was created by Guyanese for Guyanese,” the entity said.

Guyana Airways said that it is in the pre-approval stages with the GCAA, with a start-up scheduled for late spring. It noted that it will be opening its sales office very shortly in downtown, Georgetown and the hiring and interviews for the positions of flight attendants and air marshals are carded for mid-February.
The company is a privately held entity incorporated in Guyana and the United States. The board is chaired by Dr Colin Abrams, a former Guyanese Olympian and renowned pilot, who worked with Delta Airlines in the U.S. He is also a qualified medical doctor and operates in the medical field in the U.S.

For years, Guyanese here and overseas have been calling on the authorities to invest in an airline to serve key international routes under flag-carrier status. This is against the backdrop of delays and customer-service issues regarding other carriers which operate into the Cheddi Jagan International Airport (CJIA).

For decades, GAC had provided an important link for the travelling public and the airline was subsidised by the government at the time. The airline leased all its aircraft and as such, many aircraft types were used during the airline’s operations. These included Boeing 707, Boeing 737, Boeing 757 and Airbus 300 types.