As hacking remains a vexing issue for the CivilAviation Authority, industry stakeholders and other national agencies are engaged in a collaborative effort to enact additional legislation and regulations, impose harsher enforcement action, increase successful prosecution of the offending pilot and implement new initiatives to educate travellers and pilots about the risk of illegal air charters.
The Minister of Tourism and Aviation DionisioD’Aguilar says, “as a component of the remedial actions, the Authority has moved to end the practice of illegal air charter operations within Bahamian airspace.
“It has diligently implemented ‘anti-hacking’ initiatives through awareness campaigns to highlight the risks of travelling on illegal aircraft charters; proposed reforms to the civil aviation operations; and pushed for strict enforcement of civil and criminal proceedings against illegal charter operators.”
He added that the Authority has implemented a number of regulations to help curb this issue.
“All Bahamian persons holding foreign issued licenses will be required to have those licenses converted to licenses issued by the Authority for the sole purpose of increased surveillance of the persons involved.
“The Authority will increase enforcement activities and will aggressively pursue criminal and or civil penalties against all persons committing any activity that is not in compliance with Regulatory requirements.
“Those persons who choose to remain unregulated, are engaging in criminal activities. Further, persons facilitating these activities also shares culpability.
“To reiterate, all pilots seeking access to restricted areas of the General Aviation section of LPIA are now required to be in possession of a valid identification badge issued by the Security Department of the Airport Authority.
“A condition of gaining that badge is that the pilot is properly licensed to operate an aircraft in The Bahamas,” the Tourism Minister said.
Minister D’Aguilar stressed that those pilots who refuse to become regulated will be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law.
