The United States Department of Transportation (DOT) has dismissed an application from Miami Air (BSK, Miami International) to operate on an ACMI basis after the company “failed to provide the required information” and established “a pattern of providing only enough information to move to the next level of the certification process but never enough to make its authority effective.”
In a filing seen by ch-aviation, the DOT dismissed applications for interstate and foreign charter passenger authority, nearly four years after the passenger charter start-up began its process to take over the Chapter 7-bankrupt Miami Air International.
Miami Air will still be able to file for a certificate of authority in the future. However, the DOT will only entertain complete applications from the company.
The start-up initially failed to submit the information necessary to make its authority effective by September 15, 2021. Due to this failure, the DOT revoked its certificate, only for the carrier to file a new application on May 13, 2022. On January 2023, Miami Air submitted a new operating proposal, after being urged to prove its financial fitness, which included reducing the number of aircraft in its fleet to one, limiting its initial operating plan to operate under ACMI agreements, and reducing its total headcount to 65 employees from 300.
However, its only aircraft was repositioned to Europe on April 2023 after being repossessed by the aircraft owner. The ch-aviation fleets module shows former Miami Air B737-800, N735MA (msn 37260), owned by SMBC Aviation Capital, is currently flying for TUI Airways (BY, London Luton) as G-TUKR.
ch-aviation has reached out to Miami Air for comment.
