When Ricky Dos Santos first came to the Virgin Islands on a yachting vacation a few years ago, 
he looked up into the sky and expected to see helicopters. When he didn’t hear the telltale sound of rotor blades, he saw opportunity.
Mr. Dos Santos, a co-owner of the South African helicopter flight school Powered Flight, said he believes that VI tourists will want to see the islands from the air in the same way that helicopter tourism became popular in Cape Town, South Africa.
“BVI lends itself to that kind of must-do activity very much,” said Mr. Dos Santos, the co-owner of the recently founded company Antilles Helicopter Services. “In fact, there’s seven companies operating helicopters in Cape Town, and they don’t get the [visitor arrival] numbers that the BVI do on a high season day.”
Mr. Dos Santos’ company, which he co-owns with Martin Jacobs, AHS’ chief pilot, has recently rented hanger space at the Terrance B. Lettsome International Airport. The men hope to begin operating as early as October ahead of the upcoming tourism season and plan to soon deliver two helicopters – a three-passenger Robinson 44 and a four-passenger Bell Jet Ranger – to the territory.
Those aircraft will compete for the area’s helicopter passengers alongside the St. Thomas-based Caribbean Buzz Helicopters. Pilot Maria Rodriguez purchased a Robinson 44 and started the charter operation after her former employer, Air Center Helicopters, shuttered its United States VI base in 2011.
“When they closed I wanted to keep flying, so I did what I could,” Ms. Rodriguez said Tuesday.
Both helicopter pilots said that their business offers passengers an experience that they won’t get from flying in a plane because helicopters can fly lower and slower. And everybody gets a window seat.
See the Aug. 23, 2012 edition for full coverage.
{fcomment}