St. Lucia Airways

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
St. Lucia Airways
St. Lucia Airways Boeing 707-323C Hoppe
IATA code : (without)
ICAO code : SX
Call sign : SIERRA XRAY
Founding: 1975
Operation stopped: 1987
Seat: Castries , St. Lucia
Saint LuciaSt. Lucia 
Turnstile :

Ostend Airport

Home airport : Castries-Vigie Airport
Company form: Limited
Management: Dietrich Reinhardt
Number of employees: 20th
Fleet size: 8th
Aims: international
St. Lucia Airways ceased operations in 1987. The information in italics refer to the last status before the end of operation.

St. Lucia Airways was an airline based on the Caribbean island of St. Lucia . The company ceased operations in May 1987 after it became known that it was involved in the Iran-Contra affair and had carried out illegal arms transports with the consent of the United States . In the hearings for the Iran-Contra affair, St. Lucia Airways was identified as an airline owned by the US secret service CIA ( "CIA proprietary airline" ).

history

The Lockheed L-100 Hercules of St.Lucia Airways in 1985 at the Basel airport

St. Lucia Airways was founded in 1975 as a regional airline by private investors in Castries and initially used a Britten-Norman BN-2 Islander and a Douglas DC-3 for shuttle services between Castries and Hewanorra International Airport on the south coast . In addition, the company operated flights to the neighboring islands. In the spring of 1980 the fleet consisted of a Cessna 310 and three Britten-Norman BN-2 Islanders.

In the early 1980s, the company was owned by lawyer Allison Lindo. At the same time, the German citizen Dietrich Reinhardt, who lives in Miami, took over management of the company. He had contacts with the US secret service CIA and the Angolan civil war party UNITA . UNITA was supported by the USA and supplied with arms and armaments by the CIA via the neighboring state of Zaire , circumventing UN sanctions . In 1982 St Lucia Airways put their first Boeing 707 cargo aircraft into service. She had rented the machine from the US Air Consulting (a dummy company of the CIA) for international flights.

In 1984, St. Lucia-based attorney Micheal Gordon acquired the company; Reinhardt then continued to work as managing director. The company took delivery of a second Boeing 707-300C and a Lockheed L-100 Hercules in the same year . The machines were used for the CIA on charter flights between Kelly Air Force Base in San Antonio ( Texas ) and the Kamina military base in Zaire , with the planes at Hewanorra International Airport in St. Lucia and Praia International Airport in Cape Verde were refueled. After the Cape Verdean government withdrew the company's landing rights, St. Lucia Airways set up a base at Ostend Airport (Belgium), through which weapons deliveries to Zaire continued. The company also carried out regular cargo transports in sub-charter for the Belgian airline Sabena .

In July and August 1985, St. Lucia Airways transported armaments for the first time with the consent of the USA from Lille (France) to Iran . The illegal transports were organized by the Malmö- based trader Karl-Erik Schmitz, who had acquired the material from Belgian, Danish and Swedish companies. From 23 November 1985, the company flew aircraft missiles of the type Hawk , consisting of US stocks came from Ostend to Tel Aviv ( Israel were further promoted), from where the weapons systems with leased aircraft to Iran. In 1986, St. Lucia Airways transported certain anti-tank guided weapons of the type BGM-71 TOW from Ostend to Israel.

After the Iran-Contra affair became known , the government of St. Lucia initiated an investigation to investigate the company's involvement in illegal transactions and, in the event of evidence, to withdraw the company's Air Operator Certificate . Before the investigation was completed, St. Lucia Airways ceased operations in May 1987. The arms transports to Zaire were then continued by the US airline Tepper Aviation , in whose management Dietrich Reinhardt was also involved.

fleet

Fleet at the end of operations

At the time of operation, the company's fleet consisted of three Boeing 707-300C, two Britten-Norman BN-2 Islanders, two de Havilland Canada DHC-6s and a Lockheed L-100.

Previously deployed aircraft

See also

Individual evidence

  1. ^ The Crimes of a President: New Revelations on Conspiracy & Cover-up in the Bush & Reagan Administrations, Joel Bainerman, SP Books, New York, 1992, p. 267
  2. ^ Aero, issue 231, year 1988
  3. ↑ JP airline-fleets 76
  4. ↑ JP airline-fleets international, Edition 80
  5. ↑ a b c d The Arms Flyers: Commercial Aviation, Human Rights and the Business of War and Arms, Peter Danssaert & Sergio Finardi (PDF) ( Memento of the original from September 10, 2016 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and not yet checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.iansa.org
  6. ↑ JP airline-fleets international, Edition 82
  7. ↑ Flight International, December 19, 1989 (PDF)
  8. ↑ JP airline-fleets international, Edition 85
  9. ↑ United Press International: South Africa, Iran secretly trading arms for oil, documents show , November 25, 1987
  10. ^ Airline in St. Lucia warned on arms traffic, February 16, 1987
  11. ↑ Der Spiegel, Grauer Geist flies for the CIA, March 20, 1989
  12. ↑ JP airline-fleets international, Edition 87/88
  13. ↑ JP airline-fleets international, various years
  14. ^ Aviation Safety Network, October 23, 1980