Air Charter Aruba arranges flights for company retreats and incentive trips to Aruba, where a team can spend a few days together between meetings in the Palm Beach and Eagle Beach hotel areas.
Bringing the team in from several cities
Most companies have people in more than one office. We can gather everyone at one US airport, or send aircraft from two or three cities so that each group lands in Oranjestad on the same day. Tell us where your people are based, and we will suggest the arrangement that gets them there with the least travel on either end.
Matching the aircraft to the group
A team of up to eight usually fits a light, super light or midsize jet, depending on where you are flying from. Nine to sixteen people generally call for a super midsize or heavy jet. Most private charter flights run under FAR Part 135, the FAA’s rules for on-demand, for-hire charter. Once the group runs past nineteen passengers, the trip calls for an airliner-size aircraft and no longer falls under FAR Part 135. Those flights operate under FAR Part 121 or a foreign equivalent, which generally carries stricter crew and operating requirements than both Part 91 and Part 135. A large group can also be split across two smaller aircraft.
Planning around the busy season
A retreat held in the US winter shares the island with the busiest travel weeks of the year: Christmas and New Years, Carnival season in January and February, and Easter. Aircraft get booked up early around those dates, so it pays to call as soon as the dates are agreed. Every traveler also needs a passport valid for the stay and an ED card completed online before the flight, and your advisor will help the organizer make sure everyone has done it. For groups that need a bigger cabin, our VIP airliners page shows the options.
Vetting Behind Every Trip
Every operator, aircraft, and crew goes through our internal due diligence before we present any options. Our internal standards meet or exceed what the FAA requires:
- FAR Part 135 charter operators for traditional private aircraft, or FAR Part 121 for airliner-size and group trips (or the foreign equivalent on international legs)
- Operator subscription to Wyvern and ARGUS reviewed where the operator participates.
- Pilot experience and operator incident history reviewed before we recommend an aircraft.
- Fewer than 60 brokers worldwide hold Premium Wyvern Broker Member status, and Air Charter Advisors is one of them.
Aruba-Specific Patterns We Plan Around
Most Aruba trips start in the United States, and the island is busiest from Christmas through Easter, with Carnival season in January and February, so those dates book first. Queen Beatrix International in Oranjestad is the only airport, and it is closed to private flights between 11 p.m. and 7 a.m., so we plan arrival and departure times inside its hours. Every trip is international: the flight clears Aruban customs and immigration when it arrives, every passenger completes Aruba’s online ED card before traveling, and landing permission is arranged once the trip is booked. From South Florida the island is about a thousand nautical miles away and from the Northeast roughly 1,600 to 1,800, which decides whether a smaller jet needs a fuel stop. Aruba sits on the southern edge of the hurricane belt, but hurricane season runs from June 1st to November 30th, and a storm farther north can affect the flight down.
Contact
For a quote on a charter to Aruba, send the trip through our contact page or call an advisor at 1-888-987-5387. Our safety page sets out how we review operators and crews, and the aircraft gallery covers every category we arrange. We are also a member of the National Business Aviation Association.