The Insiders' Guide to St. Barths: New Juliana/Winair Chaos

I arrived on November 2 to the same chaos. we arrived from charlotte on usairways at precisely 4:08 p.m. we got on the bus to the terminal and headed for the transit winair person with people in line ahead of me. I asked the supervisor standing beside the winair agent if I would make it as it was 4:25 by that time, he assured me, no problem. He rushed me through with another lady and small child with a handwritten boarding pass through the x-ray machines then to the gate. when we arrived at the gate, we saw the winair plane just moving towards the runway. It was 4:31 at that time. I said call the plane as it looks empty. the supervisor said he couldn't reach the pilot because the new terminal does not allow his cell phone to work. He said that the plane had to leave at 4:30 because of the "sundown" rules of st. barth. He offered me a hotel voucher and taxi voucher and promised I would be on the morning flight.

In the meantime as we were walking towards the main part of the airport exit, I saw other people standing around and asked them where they were going. they said they had just chartered a winair flight leaving at 5:15 for 850 dollars going to st. barth and could use another person to split the cost. I then asked the supervisor how the winair plane could leave if there was a "sundown" law. he told me that it didn't apply to charters. by this time other people were coming over and had heard our conversations and he almost had a riot on his hands as they were also going to st. barths and were stranded. they finally cancelled the charter flight as people were getting so angry they felt it was best to just strand everyone.
About 5:45 a man came in and offered to take all of us on ski pilou to st. barth's for 100 euros apiece and 20 dollars apiece for the transportation to the yacht. there were 20 of us and they had 2 boats.

The man driving our taxi to the boat was laughing about the voyager. He said he was going to make his money while he could as he knew the airport would be screwed up for a long time.

The ride on ski pilou, I was on out of africa was very smooth and a very elegant ride. I went to the bathroom downstairs inside the cabin and it was so beautiful and air conditioned. I will say we arrived in style.

When I talked with the winair manager the next day waiting for my luggage, he was very upset, he said he thinks winair will go out of business as they can't afford to keep messing up in St. martin and returning peoples money. He said next week the planes are sold out with people arriving from charlotte on usairways at 4:08. He also said there is no way any of those people will make the flight.

I feel sad about what is happening as this island is going to suffer from loss of revenue. there was a couple at the airport yesterday and changed their plans from st. barth's (they had not made hotel reservations) to saba. I think they will be disappointed, but we still lose.