Sunrise Airways (S6, Port au Prince) has announced plans to make its North American mainland debut during the last quarter of the year.

The Haitian carrier said in a statement issued this week that, subject to government approval, it plans to start a 3x weekly Port au Prince-Orlando International, United States service from October 17 onwards.

Operations would be onboard A320-200 equipment, wet-leased from a third party operator. Given Haiti is not an International Aviation Safety Assessment (IASA) Category 1 listed country, the operator itself would have to have US Department of Transportation (DOT) as well as Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) consent to operate the flights. Sunrise's current ACMI partner is Lithuania's Avion Express (X9, Vilnius) from which it wet-leases LY-VEL (msn 1998).

“For us, as an airline, and more importantly for the sizable Haitian community living in the Orlando area, these new flights are a tremendous development,” said Philippe Bayard, President of Sunrise Airways. “As Haiti’s hometown airline, Sunrise is especially proud to be the first to bring the convenience of nonstop service between Port-au-Prince and Orlando to the Central Florida market.”

Sunrise Airways also operates Jetstream 32s for use on flights to Cap Haitien domestically as well as Camagüey, Santiago de Cuba, Santo Domingo La Isabela, and Santo Domingo Las Américas regionally.