268 Avenida Luis Munoz Rivera, 9th Floor, San Juan, Puerto Rico 00918 

March 31, 2014 

US Department of Transportation 

Docket Operations, M-20 

West Building Ground Floor 

Room W12-140 

1200 New Jersey Avenue, SE 

Washington, DC 20590 

Re: Request for exemption to 14 CFR 121.339(a) 

Background:

Executive Airlines, DBA American Eagle operated a network of turboprop service throughout the 

Caribbean Islands from a hub in San Juan, Puerto Rico utilizing ATR-72 aircraft from the 1990’s 

through March 2013. At that time Executive ceased operations, leaving many Caribbean islands 

without a direct link to San Juan. As a business, commercial, and medical hub for the Caribbean 

region, San Juan provides the residents of many smaller islands with services that are not available on 

their home islands. When Executive operated many of these routes, they did so under an Extended 

Overwater – Partially Equipped program utilizing the relief available under Operating Specification 

A013. This allowed them to operate up to 162 nautical miles from shore without life rafts, and to serve 

the entire island chain with efficient, direct routings. 

Seaborne Virgin Islands, Inc. DBA Seaborne Airlines, FAA air carrier S9BA675J began operation on 

some of these routes from San Juan in April 2013 utilizing Saab 340 turboprop aircraft. These aircraft 

were designed with a similar mission and systems design, and have very similar performance to the 

ATR-72. Currently the FAA Order 8900 guidance stipulates that OpSpec A013 may be issued only to 

turbojet operators, which prevents Seaborne from providing the same level of service that was 

previously offered in these markets. Without relief the carrier is restricted to flight routing within 50 

nautical miles of land or is required to equip the aircraft with life rafts. The 50 mile limitation prevents 

the carrier from practically serving the islands south of Martinique, as the required routing adds 

additional time and cost while the additional fuel requirement reduces payload capacity to 

uneconomical levels. The addition of life rafts to the aircraft would constitute a costly burden to the 

carrier for the certification of a raft installation, additional crewmember training, and raft maintenance. 

Additionally, the raft installation as proposed by Saab would result in the loss of 4 passenger seats, 

which reduces the revenue generation potential of the aircraft by 12 percent. 

Relief Sought and Justification for Relief:

Seaborne Virgin Islands requests relief from the requirement to carry life rafts, flares, and locating 

beacons as required by 14 CFR 121.339(a)(2), (3), and (4) for operations over the Caribbean Sea and 

adjacent areas of the Atlantic Ocean for operations within 98 nautical miles (30 minutes at single 

engine enroute speed) of shoreline. This deviation would also incorporate 121.339(b) and (c) as these 

items are secondary to the raft requirement. This relief would be identical to the relief available under 

OpSpec A013 if it were currently available to a turboprop operator. This type of operation has 

previously been determined acceptable to the Administrator as demonstrated by the prior issuance of 

OpSpec A013 to Executive Airlines. 

Equivalent Level of Safety: 

The requested relief will increase the distance limit of 50 nautical miles from shore to 98nm. There are 

no procedural or operational changes required with the addition of this deviation. The carrier is 

already approved for GPS primary navigation under OpSpec B034 and Class II navigation with a 
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single long-range sensor under OpSpec B054. Therefore, no additional flight crew training would be 

required for the navigational procedures required by this deviation. Enroute engine failure and driftdown procedures are currently published in the carrier’s approved Company Flight Manual for the 

Saab 340 aircraft, and are applicable over our current route structure in the same manner that they 

would apply to operations out to 98 miles from shore. Due to the fact that most of the carrier’s route 

structure is over water, ditching training, which includes a wet life jacket drill, is already included in 

both initial and recurrent training through the carrier’s approved FOTM. The scenario-based recurrent 

training delivered to all pilots on an annual basis includes an overwater engine failure scenario. This 

presents an instructor-guided review of emergency procedures specific to overwater operations 

including drift-down and diversion, single-engine enroute operations, and communication procedures 

for an enroute emergency. 

This application package contains an example of the overwater operations manual that would be used 

for this operation. In order to ensure the highest level of safety, this manual has been designed to 

cover normal, non-normal, and emergency procedures required for operations up to 98 nautical miles 

from shore. The allowable operating area is clearly defined and depicted to prevent any confusion. 

The table of required equipment contained in this manual was prepared through careful review of the 

carrier’s approved MEL. If any piece of equipment on this list is inoperative the aircraft may not be 

dispatched on overwater legs more than 50 miles from shore even though it is still legal for dispatch 

under Part 121. 

This application package also contains an item by item response from the carrier to each requirement 

of the Order 8900 guidance Chapter 3 Section 3-737 OpSpec A013 Paragraph G which covers the 

requirements for approval of a partially equipped overwater operations program in order to illustrate 

full compliance. 

The Saab 340 aircraft operated by Seaborne Airlines is a mature design with a 30 year service history 

of reliable operation and a very low inflight engine shutdown rate. The type’s robust design 

redundancy ensures that no single failure, including an engine shutdown, would result in loss of 

navigational capability or other impairment that would prevent a safe diversion. Due to the tropical 

maritime environment of the carrier’s theater of operation, additional preventative maintenance steps 

have already been added to ensure continued airworthiness of the carrier’s Saab 340 fleet. There is 

no reason to expect that an increase in the allowed distance from shore would have any detrimental 

impact on the fleet’s safety record. 

Finally, it is noteworthy that the carrier intends to conduct overwater operations over one of the least 

threatening bodies of water on the planet. The Caribbean Sea has an average surface temperature of 

nearly 80 degrees year round, equivalent to a heated swimming pool. This is warm enough that in the 

extremely unlikely event of a ditching, hypothermia would not be a threat even without the provision of 

life rafts. Should a ditching occur, search and rescue assets of the U.S., Dutch, and French 

governments including helicopters and long-range aircraft, are available throughout the carrier’s 

operating area. 

These conditions provide an equivalent level of safety when compared to operations conducted within 

50 miles of the nearest shoreline. 

Benefit to the Public Interest:

This deviation would allow Seaborne Airlines to provide convenient, non-stop services between the 

southern Caribbean islands and San Juan, Puerto Rico. This would restore vital interisland services 

which were offered by American Eagle until 2013. San Juan is the commercial, business, and medical 

hub of the Caribbean region, and currently these islands are only connected to San Juan via lengthy 

island-hopping routes or inconvenient connections through Miami. This causes an undue hardship on 
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approximately 1.9 million people in five island nations that depend on the services available in San 

Juan. 

Request:

Seaborne Virgin Islands, Inc. DBA Seaborne Airlines is requesting a deviation from the requirement 

to carry life rafts, flares, and locating beacons as required by 14 CFR 121.339(a)(2), (3), and (4) for 

operations over the Caribbean Sea and adjacent areas of the Atlantic Ocean for operations within 98 

nautical miles (30 minutes at single engine enroute speed) of shoreline. This deviation would also 

incorporate 121.339(b) and (c) as these items are secondary to the raft requirement. 

Thank you in advance for your consideration of this request for exemption. 

Warmest Regards, 

Dani J. Auslander 

Dani J. Auslander 

Director of Safety and Regulatory Compliance 

Seaborne Airlines 

Petitioner's Contact Information: 

268 Avenida Luis Munoz Rivera, 9th Floor 

San Juan, Puerto Rico 00918 

(787) 946-8150 - office 

dauslander@seaborneairlines.com