Roatan Vacation Plane Wreck

[RTBDiver]

While some rather just keep using the "your not in kansas anymore" type excuse the facts remain that even in Honduras a plane needs to be certified for commercial use through their aviation department, just because it may not be enforced does not make it right just as not enforcing lobster laws does not make it right to take tiny lobsters or egg bearing lobsters or any out of season, Do any of those to seemingly know about this operation know if this plane was certified for commercial use or was it another cowboy operation by a foreigner that knows better and just didn't worry about it. It seems strange that if all was up and up that thier website would almost immediately shut down with no statements at all. Wouldn't they want to do some sort of PR control and get ready when the insurance company bought a new plane

 

[ScubaSteve]

Heck, I'd likely go up in a plane knowing it was experimental......I doubt I would take my son up though knowing that. There is risk in anything. People like Hypersonic will find sufficient risk to avoid it in anything that they want to when they want to. Fear of everything suits them. I am OK with that. Look at all the disasters in the world involving people and equipment that do meet the required standards. Sometimes **** just happens. That is life. And the fact that Hypersonic makes the claim that the operators were ONLY running this business down there because they could get around the laws is absolutely ridiculous. By that logic, the millions of people that operate businesses in countries that are outside of their home nation are just accidents waiting to happen because they are avoiding the laws of their home.

 

[RTBDiver]

By that logic, the millions of people that operate businesses in countries that are outside of their home nation are just accidents waiting to happen because they are avoiding the laws of their home.

Sure they don't worry about the laws of their home country but many follow the laws of the country they do business in, Maybe these folks were but those in the know seem to keep avoiding answering whether the plane was a legal commercial aircraft in Honduras in which it then would have had to pass more requirements. There is a difference between doing business legal in a foreign country and not being legal just because you might not get caught.

 

[ScubaSteve]

.....but those in the know seem to keep avoiding answering whether the plane was a legal commercial aircraft in Honduras......

I am not sure I follow your last sentence. I think you meant to say:

"There is a difference between doing business legally in a foreign country and operating illegally just because you might not get caught."
​

If that is the case, then.....well of course there is a difference. I find it funny however, how Hypersonic jumped to claiming the Operator was operating in Roatan simply because they could get around the requirements of the US. That is what I find comical. Hence the tinfoil hat. If anybody here can validate his claim then I am happy to call it the truth. Until that happens, I am going to write it off as a scared individual.

 

[Mike]

Sure they don't worry about the laws of their home country but many follow the laws of the country they do business in, Maybe these folks were but those in the know seem to keep avoiding answering whether the plane was a legal commercial aircraft in Honduras in which it then would have had to pass more requirements. There is a difference between doing business legal in a foreign country and not being legal just because you might not get caught.

Who the heck is 'in the know' ? You have a house down there, you're more in know then most here, pick up the phone and call somebody and report back.

Hypersonic kept going on about how the plane doesn't meet FAA requirements. The plane was flown in Honduras so obviously it isn't required to. He's either very naive or obviously just never realized that the United States government agencies, rules and regulations aren't going to apply to anything outside of the United States.

You also assume they had insurance, again it's in Honduras. Are there requirements to have insurance? Many companies in the US have different insurances because they are required to and if they weren't they wouldn't and don't. In my business I have many requirements and I have many that aren't required. For a truck I will have the basic liability requirements because I'm required to, which will protect somebody we have an accident with, but that doesn't mean I'm going to insure a 10 year old work vehicle with comprehensive insurance to cover replacement, so in an accident the other guy is covered because that's the law, but I'm out of luck. Secondly, how many businesses in Honduras are cash cows just flowing with cash flow? They were operating a niche business in a down market, a market hit hard by the US recession. They probably were just making a living and getting by, like most down there, and if they had insurance to cover the replacement of their airplane I'd be surprised. So many businesses both in Honduras and in the US are operating just one hiccup away from going out of business. All it usually takes is one problem and suddenly a business owner says, why bother, it's just not worth it, I was busing my ass 80 hours a week and not making any money anyways. How many dive shops have come and gone, how many restaurants have come and gone in Roatan, it happens all the time. With the loss of their plane and the state of business they're probably looking at this as time to quit instead of starting over. The owner is not a spring chicken. Not to mention the hurdles they face with bad publicity. How many crashes does it take for an aviation business to be driven out of business? Probably one in this case.

 

[adjuster-jd]

Does anyone know whose dive boat went out to help these people?

 

[RTBDiver]

They were first met by the parasail boat, the boat with the Doctors was the Aggresor

 

[RTBDiver]

You also assume they had insurance, again it's in Honduras. Are there requirements to have insurance? .

No Mike,
I said they had insurance because if you look into the other forum you referred to it is mentioned more than once that the plane was fully insured and certified, the only thing I may have assumed was the one posting that was correct. It.s really all a non issue now that they seem to have abandoned ship anyways

 

[DandyDon]

One acid test I use when considering excursions for me is "Does my trip insurance cover such...??"

I could not get the linked video to play. Here is a new report with a good video: Atkins Family Saved By Strangers After Plane Crash

 

[DeputyDan]

Hypersonic kept going on about how the plane doesn't meet FAA requirements. The plane was flown in Honduras so obviously it isn't required to. He's either very naive or obviously just never realized that the United States government agencies, rules and regulations aren't going to apply to anything outside of the United States.

Read a post in the Cozumel section were a poster had let his next door neighbors (in the USA) use his Cozumel condo for a week. The neighbors could not get over the fact that they spoke Spanish in Cozumel. I don't know if an American tourist can do something stupid enough to amaze me anymore!