It is more than a month since hundreds of jubilant Dominicans gathered at the Melville Hall airport and some forty brave citizens, including Dominica’s president Dr Nicholas Liverpool boarded a LIAT Dash 8 aircraft for an inaugural night landing.
LIAT planes are so far staying away from Dominica at night.
Today, the lights are out and what seemed like a promising development in Dominica is quickly turning out to be a source of immense embarrassment for the Skerrit administration.
After spending tens of millions of dollars on upgrading the facility at Melville Hall, and getting the Eastern Caribbean Aviation Authority to sign off on its air worthiness, reality is beginning to set in – No night landing in Melville Hall, at least for now.
The trouble started just days after the inaugural flight on September 20, 2010 when LIAT announced that they were not quite ready to begin regular night flights into Dominica. LIAT’s Chief Executive Officer Brian Challenger revealed that he was forced to use his most experienced pilots in conducting the test flights and inaugural flight, and based on the feedback his airline would need to give added training to the other pilots.
In other words, don’t expect any regular flights anytime soon. The Chief Executive also indicated that there were still outstanding issues to be addressed. For its part, officials from American Eagle have consistently maintained that they are not yet ready to commence night landing operations into Dominica.
So while the airline authorities have given the go-ahead for night landings, the pilots are having second thoughts. Many observers believe that the main problem is due to the fact that landings would need to be approached from the sea rather than over the mountains as is currently the case.
The airport is surrounded by towering mountain ranges in close proximity including Dominica’s highest peak Morne Diablotin. The fear usually expressed is in the event that the landing would need to be aborted there might not be enough room between the airport and the mountain for the plane to once again get airborne.
Whatever the reason, LIAT felt it prudent enough to forgo a potentially lucrative route in the interest of safety.
The collapse of the effort prompted former Prime Minister Edison James to accuse the Skerrit Administration of fooling the Dominican people. According to James, “the recent statements by officials of American Eagle and LIAT regarding night landing at the Melville Hall Airport has revealed that the people of Dominica were the victims of massive deception by the Roosevelt Skerrit administration and even more seriously the lives of citizens were put in heightened danger.”
He went on to say, “we are also very disappointed that LIAT should have allowed itself to be pressured by the Dominica Government into lowering its usually high safety standards by getting involved in that thirty-four thousand dollar danger flight into Melville Hall Airport in September.”
Now just days before the staging of the World Creole Music Festival, organizers are attempting to put a favorable spin to that development. Vice Chairman of the Creole Festival Committee Sobers Esprit was quoted as saying that “the committee would do the best that they can with what they have.” Already, hundreds of patrons wishing to come into Dominica are having difficulty finding flights for the weekend celebrations.
Now with the jubilant crowds who turned out in September seeming to be in the distant past, a confused populace is left to wonder if those lights will ever be turned on again on the dark Melville Hall airport runway, or if the stillness of the Dominica night will be broken by the sound of aircraft landings.
