ASL could soon get green light for Ogle fuel farm

Following the recent controversy at Ogle Airport, with the temporary disruption of aviation fuel to Air Services Limited, General Manager of Air Services Limited (ASL) Mrs. Annette Arjoon-Martins has announced that the approval for the commercial operation of the ASL fuel farm appears imminent.

ASL General Manager Annette Arjoon-Martins

This development comes after an emergency meeting convened by the Minister of Public Works and Communication, Robeson Benn.

“Air Services Limited is deeply appreciative of the recent intervention of Minister Robeson Benn under whose portfolio the aviation industry falls.

An emergency meeting had been convened at the Minister’s instruction involving the Guyana Civil Aviation Authority (GCCA), Ogle Airport Inc. (OAI), Caribbean Aviation Maintenance Services (CAMS) and ASL. “The GCCA came to the meeting tasked with a mandate from the Minister to address and resolve the aviation fuel supply irregularity at Ogle Airport, and I am happy to say that the road map to achieve this was clearly identified,” Arjoon-Martins stated.

 However, the ASL General Manager expressed concern that even as those efforts are being made to clarify and resolve the issues at Ogle Airport, the Public Relations Consultant for OAI, Christopher Nascimento, chose  to mis-inform the media immediately following  the meeting.

According to Arjoon-Martins, “It is beyond unfortunate to see Mr. Nascimento’s flippant remark to the media that ASL was making a mountain out of molehill on the fuel supply interruption.

Mr Nascimento, who neither owns nor operates a single aircraft, cannot possibly understand the distress felt by ASL when faced with  the possible grounding of our  fleet of 21 aircraft and two helicopters, moreso, as a result of an issue completely beyond our control.”

Citing further examples of mis-information by Mr. Nascimento, Arjoon-Martins pointed to explanations by Nascimento about the comingling of fuel.

“Mr. Nascimento says the comingling of aviation fuel is nothing new, but yet, in 2011, when ASL, with Government approval, imported its own aviation fuel in ISO-approved containers from Chevron, Miami, CAMS cut off ASL’s fuel supply because of their serious comingling concerns.”

The fuel had been brought in directly from Chevron USA in ISO-approved containers conforming to international standards. “What Nascimento omitted to say was that a few months later CAMS followed ASL’s example and commenced importing aviation fuel in the same ISO containers as the savings were substantial.” She quoted Mr. Nascimento as saying that ASL had decided to build its own fuel farm because “Government had intervened and told ASL to comply with the international standards.” “This is also false. When ASL first imported its fuel, OAI went to court to prevent ASL from bringing any further fuel onto the airfield, on the contention that ASL did not have permanent storage facilities. ASL therefore immediately applied to OAI for land to build its own permanent storage facilities, but received no acknowledgement of its application by OAI. “It was only when Government intervened, months later, following a request from ASL, that approval for land was granted,” Arjoon-Martins explained. She also took umbrage to Nascimento’s contention that the “construction of the ASL farm has been completed and sits on the airport, unused”, which implied an ASL failure. She said that among the reasons was that ASL followed the procedures for fuel management in the Ogle Airport Operations Manual 2007, Section 4:22 which was approved by GCCA, during the construction of its fuel farm. According to her, while construction was going on, during December 2011 to December 2012, at no time during that entire year did OAI advise ASL of additional requirements for compliance. However, between March and August 2013, OAI provided ASL with several versions of undated and unsigned copies of fuel farm licence applications with varying insurance values. She said that her company’s lawyers reviewed the documents, deemed them inequitable and not transparent, and advised against signing. Mrs. Arjoon-Martins said, “As this matter moves to resolution, it is more important than ever that all the parties come to our discussions with both the relevant authority to speak and with an adherence to facts instead of innuendo.”