NewsWhore
04-14-2010, 04:30 PM
Investigations into the disappearance of an airplane that left the Joaquin Balaguer International Airport at El Higuero (La Isabela) en route for Port-au-Prince, but which is known to have flown to Colombia, have uncovered an illegal ring that handled clandestine flights using local airports.
Diario Libre reports that according to the investigators, these flights transported people and money. Besides the "mysterious" disappearances of a Cessna 210L Centurion, serial number 21059588 on Sunday, 7 March, and the Cessna C-210 with tail number N-2066S, last December, the authorities added yesterday the flight of a Cessna 172 AP, tail number N6028Y, to the file of "disappearing" airplanes. This flight left from El Portillo Airport in Samana bound for Punta Cana, disappeared from radars and is known to have landed in a clandestine field in Puerto Rico.
According to information obtained by Diario Libre from the investigators of the inter-institutional commission in charge of solving the thorny case, this latest event occurred last 16 November. The airplane left with 5 people on board, including 2 children and a Cuban woman. The clandestine flight was piloted by Roberto Enrique Bourgeois, a US citizen, who the authorities have established had made several clandestine flights with the Cessna 172 AP, using local airports as a base of operations. Bourgeois was flying despite the fact that his pilot's license had been suspended by the Federal Aviation Administration in 2005. "Clandestine flights are leaving from several points around the country. There is a 'mafia' that is taking people out of the country", Assistant Attorney General Bolivar Sanchez told Diario Libre. Sanchez heads the commission that is investigating these flights.
He noted that the mafias are taking advantage of the reduced paperwork in place to encourage small plane tourism, domestic aviation and the use of domestic airports. The requirement of filing a flight plan was removed for local flights, and there are no migration controls. The pilot only has to communicate his route by radio.
Sanchez questioned the weak controls surrounding airport security that allow undocumented foreigners to walk around freely in restricted areas of the air terminals in the DR. But he also asked how the airplane that left Portillo in Samana could have entered Puerto Rico without being under the control of Puerto Rican air traffic controllers.
More... (http://www.dr1.com/index.html#10)
Diario Libre reports that according to the investigators, these flights transported people and money. Besides the "mysterious" disappearances of a Cessna 210L Centurion, serial number 21059588 on Sunday, 7 March, and the Cessna C-210 with tail number N-2066S, last December, the authorities added yesterday the flight of a Cessna 172 AP, tail number N6028Y, to the file of "disappearing" airplanes. This flight left from El Portillo Airport in Samana bound for Punta Cana, disappeared from radars and is known to have landed in a clandestine field in Puerto Rico.
According to information obtained by Diario Libre from the investigators of the inter-institutional commission in charge of solving the thorny case, this latest event occurred last 16 November. The airplane left with 5 people on board, including 2 children and a Cuban woman. The clandestine flight was piloted by Roberto Enrique Bourgeois, a US citizen, who the authorities have established had made several clandestine flights with the Cessna 172 AP, using local airports as a base of operations. Bourgeois was flying despite the fact that his pilot's license had been suspended by the Federal Aviation Administration in 2005. "Clandestine flights are leaving from several points around the country. There is a 'mafia' that is taking people out of the country", Assistant Attorney General Bolivar Sanchez told Diario Libre. Sanchez heads the commission that is investigating these flights.
He noted that the mafias are taking advantage of the reduced paperwork in place to encourage small plane tourism, domestic aviation and the use of domestic airports. The requirement of filing a flight plan was removed for local flights, and there are no migration controls. The pilot only has to communicate his route by radio.
Sanchez questioned the weak controls surrounding airport security that allow undocumented foreigners to walk around freely in restricted areas of the air terminals in the DR. But he also asked how the airplane that left Portillo in Samana could have entered Puerto Rico without being under the control of Puerto Rican air traffic controllers.
More... (http://www.dr1.com/index.html#10)