The Sarasota-Manatee Airport is a small, money-losing operation that handles 1,000-2,000 passenger arrivals per day. The two majors who fly there are Delta and American. Most flights are "general aviation," with dozens of arrivals and departures each day. It's pretty standard for a regional airport to lose money, most of them do, nothing suspicious there. The airport has its own police force, which is more unusual. Other U.S. airports, even very large ones, are policed by state or city or port authority police who answer to someone outside the airport itself. The website explains that SRQ sits at the junction of Sarasota municipality, and two counties, which doesn't really explain why it has to have its own police force.
Sarasota has two FBOs or fixed base operations: Dolphin was founded in 1969 and appears to only operate at Sarasota; Rectrix is a chain with four newish bases in Massachusetts. Again, it is not really that odd that Rectrix should branch out to Sarasota. One of its MA airfields does almost nothing else but serve vacation traffic to Florida. But between the two, Rectrix is the more promising target for investigation because it operates its own charter fleet and has worldwide operating authority for its jets.
Trying to trace the origin of that worldwide certification is tricky. Rectrix bought New World Jet Corporation from Gold Jets in 2009. Gold Jets had bought New World Jet Corporation from its original owner, "New Mexico businessman Kern Mattei," in December 2006. But I can't discover anything more about Kern Mattei.
I agree it seems a bit shady, but so far, nobody associated with Rectrix, Dolphin, or New World has turned out to be a Shriner, Jester, or SOBIB. Doesn't prove they're not, of course, just that I didn't find anything.
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SoberSecondThought ago
The Sarasota-Manatee Airport is a small, money-losing operation that handles 1,000-2,000 passenger arrivals per day. The two majors who fly there are Delta and American. Most flights are "general aviation," with dozens of arrivals and departures each day. It's pretty standard for a regional airport to lose money, most of them do, nothing suspicious there. The airport has its own police force, which is more unusual. Other U.S. airports, even very large ones, are policed by state or city or port authority police who answer to someone outside the airport itself. The website explains that SRQ sits at the junction of Sarasota municipality, and two counties, which doesn't really explain why it has to have its own police force.
Sarasota has two FBOs or fixed base operations: Dolphin was founded in 1969 and appears to only operate at Sarasota; Rectrix is a chain with four newish bases in Massachusetts. Again, it is not really that odd that Rectrix should branch out to Sarasota. One of its MA airfields does almost nothing else but serve vacation traffic to Florida. But between the two, Rectrix is the more promising target for investigation because it operates its own charter fleet and has worldwide operating authority for its jets.
Trying to trace the origin of that worldwide certification is tricky. Rectrix bought New World Jet Corporation from Gold Jets in 2009. Gold Jets had bought New World Jet Corporation from its original owner, "New Mexico businessman Kern Mattei," in December 2006. But I can't discover anything more about Kern Mattei.
I agree it seems a bit shady, but so far, nobody associated with Rectrix, Dolphin, or New World has turned out to be a Shriner, Jester, or SOBIB. Doesn't prove they're not, of course, just that I didn't find anything.