By Peter Stevenson
SIGHT-SEEING in Cyprus’ more remotes areas used to be limited to those with four-by-four vehicles or perhaps quad bikes. Now, for €630 per person, you can hire a helicopter for the whole day to visit the Akamas peninsula or Kykkos monastery.
The trip includes air transfer to a secluded beach with an umbrella, sun-beds and beach towels. The price also includes a stocked refreshment cooler with beer, water, soft drinks, white wine, crisps, cold sandwiches and fruit.
For Ioannis Sivitanides, one of the three founders of Skyraiders, these bespoke, though pricey tours, have been a struggle to get off the ground as he fights with the civil aviation department over permits.
The company can currently only operate as an aero-sport club (under the name Skyriders) as it is missing one, final permit which would enable it to operate commercial flights. For the time being they are forced to offer their services as an aero-sport club.
This means that to take a helicopter tour, customers need to pay a one-off €75 initiation or membership fee. This is the only way to get around not possessing the final permit, he explained.
By only operating limited tour flights across the island, mainly in the Akamas peninsula, Skyraiders is hardly covering helicopter operating costs.
“Despite some of our packages appearing expensive they barely cover our helicopter’s operating costs,” he said.
The importance of becoming an air operator would not only mean more income, but it would make Cyprus competitive with other countries like Malta, Spain, Greece and Turkey in this alternative form of tourism.
“Tourist operators abroad don’t take us seriously as an aero-sport club despite offering attractive packages with flights over Akamas and visits to Kykkos Monastery and this final permit would mean we could attract a large amount of tourists,” Sivitanides explained.
The club has one Robinson 44 Astro helicopter, a hanger in Yeroskipou which is fully equipped and cost around €70,000 to build with offices, CCTV and necessary fire safety equipment. They also have one helipad in Kykkos and another near the Aphrodite Baths in Neo Chorio and Akamas which each cost around €5,000 to build.
After completing one year of military service in the Cyprus army special forces, Sivitanides was accepted into the Greek air force academy. He graduated with the rank of flying second lieutenant and trained with the Hellenic air force as a fighter jet pilot, later transferring to Cyprus where he was trained and served as a fighter helicopter pilot. He later resigned his commission and was honourably discharged as lieutenant in the Cyprus air force and travelled to the USA where he was licensed as a commercial and instructor pilot and later received his European licences. He also worked for many years as a pilot for helicopter emergency medical services and fire-fighting operations.
The company’s other two owners are maintenance director Demetris Koulinides and Sivitanides brother, Antonis who is head of sales and marketing.
Sivitanides said he felt that adding commercial helicopter flights could add to Cyprus’ attempts to bring in high-end tourism.
“We already have a marina in Limassol which caters for big yachts and various other services so this is the logical next step, especially if we want compete with other countries in the Mediterranean,” he said.
The sticking point for the Cyprus department of civil aviation has been the unavailability on a 24-hour, seven day a week basis of a mechanic for their helicopter. Civil aviation have told the company that they cannot give them the final piece of paperwork until a certified Robinson-44 Astro helicopter mechanic is permanently on the island.
In particular, SkyRaiders and the department for civil aviation have disagreed on the wording of the European Air Safety Agency’s (EASA) regulations with Sivitanides feeling it is adequate for the necessary mechanic to live in Greece.
“We can’t possibly employ a mechanic full time at the hangar every day doing nothing until it is time for the scheduled maintenance – that is every 50 hours and in our case that means every 60 days because we fly an average of 30-45 minutes every day,” said Sivitanides. “The remaining 59 days he would not have anything to do. When the time comes and we fly seven hours every day, we will have a mechanic at the hangar because in a week you would need the 50 hours scheduled maintenance.”
In his efforts to clear up the disagreement Sivitanides sent a letter to EASA asking for clarifications.
“The agency cannot interfere within the discussion between an organisation and its competent authority,” the reply from EASA said but then offered detailed guidelines which looked at the specific needs of Sivitanides’ company. Amongst the points raised by the regulatory body were references to the company’s expected workload, availability and travel times of the engineer, bearing in mind the mechanic might also be working for other companies.
Sivitanides said he believes the EASA letter clarified that it is not necessary for their mechanic to be based full-time in Cyprus.
The civil aviation, however, remains unconvinced. An official of the safety regulatory unit at the department told the Sunday Mail that once Sky Raiders meet their demands they would be more than willing to approve them as an air operator but air safety was not something that could be compromised.
“Civil aviation cannot agree to give a permit and fully approve a company that does not have an approved licensed engineer on the island,” said the official who did not wish to be named.
He explained that as well as scheduled maintenance which takes place depending on the amount of hours flown by the aircraft, there are unscheduled maintenance checks which need to be carried out.
“What would happen if a warning light comes on and the mechanic is in another country? Would the company cancel all flights on that day? That’s not something we are willing to contemplate, so we have demanded that a certified mechanic is at least within driving distance,” the official said.
In response Sivitanides said that like all airlines, if a problem arose with the helicopter then all flights would be grounded until it was checked out.
“Does the department of civil aviation believe we are a bunch of amateurs that would disregard warning lights and continue to put people’s lives at risk including our own? The very fact that they have put in doubt that we would follow internationally accepted procedure is very disheartening,” he said.
He was convinced, he said, that Greece was close enough for a mechanic to travel to the island for scheduled and un-scheduled maintenance checks.
Sivitanides said they had also sent a helicopter mechanic, who lives in Cyprus and is an experienced helicopter mechanic, to England to get a certificate specifically for the R-44 but that civil aviation did not recognise the certificate.
“All of our efforts have been rejected by the department, we sent a mechanic abroad, they didn’t recognise his certificate from England, we have a certified mechanic in accordance to EASA’s regulations and yet we can’t seem to get approval,” he said.
The civil aviation official said he had no knowledge of this, but that in any case the regulations were clear.
“Our job is to abide by EU and Cyprus regulations and no matter how much pressure we receive from anyone to give them a permit, if the company does not meet all of the regulations we demand, we cannot give them the necessary paperwork,” he said.
For more information on prices and tours visit: www.skyraidersltd.com
