State: Airline opens a path to Cuba

Now, a new charter airline with service to Cuba -- the only one to fly out of the Tampa Bay area -- could build a bridge between the Safety Harbor man and his family.

Operators of Air MarBrisa, which means sea breeze, hope to capitalize on the thousands of other Tampa area Cuban-Americans and a burgeoning number of curious travelers as pressure rises to relax the U.S. trade embargo and travel restrictions against the island.

Airline CEO Robert Curtis plans to launch Air MarBrisa's first flights within the next 10 days. His Fairchild Metro twin-engine prop jet will run initial trips with cargo loaded at Tampa Bay Executive Airport in Odessa. By Christmas, it will ferry passengers from St. Petersburg-Clearwater International Airport. The flights must stop in Miami to clear customs before continuing to Cuba.

For Bande, 70, the airline opens the door to see his siblings again after four decades and to show his wife, eight children and 18 grandchildren the land he could only tell them about. He and his wife say they'll be the first passengers. They already have boxes packed full of medicines, fish nets and household goods for family members.

"It's a dream," Bande said. "I told my kids, "You are all going to Cuba next year . . . We are going to stay in the attic.' I want my family there to know the wonderful family I got here. I could cry, honey, I could cry with the emotion."

Though Bande can't stand the wait -- calling the airline sometimes daily -- Curtis knows all about patience.

Getting off the ground

Curtis, 55, started down the path to connect Tampa and Cuba four years ago. He's the chief operating officer for Strong Arm Cargo Inc. in Odessa, which will run the airline.

In March, two special licenses finally arrived from the U.S. Treasury Department to operate a carrier and travel arrangement service to Cuba. The Cuban government granted him approval this year, he said, but officials in Cuba could not be reached for comment. The Federal Aviation Administration signed off on the operation Oct. 31, FAA officials said.

Curtis hired 10 pilots and will work with Miami associate Armin Altarac, a specialist in international transportation for more than 30 years.

"This whole thing I thought at one point was pie in the sky," said Curtis, a retired FAA air traffic control supervisor who's been running a nationwide cargo service while waiting. "I'd given up a half dozen times."

But the need is here, he believes. Cubans sending or bringing money and goods make up one of the largest forms of income in the country. The island's economy nearly collapsed in the early 1990s following the fall of the Soviet Union, its chief financial supporter. Cubans struggle for basic daily needs, such as food, toothpaste, medicine, shampoo or deodorant.

For more than 10 years, Fidel Castro has been leaning on tourism for money. Last year, 140,000 Americans visited Cuba legally, and another 60,000 visited illegally through third countries.

Curtis will help travelers get visas -- as long is their purpose doesn't violate the embargo. Legal travel to Cuba is restricted to people with relatives there, students, educators, and professionals such as journalists, doctors and athletes. Cultural exchange programs count.

Right now, travelers from the bay area who want to legally visit Cuba must drive five hours to Miami and stand in lines for hours waiting for plane tickets and customs clearance. Packages sent to Cuba sometimes take a month to arrive, if they arrive at all.

Curtis is guaranteeing that cargo shipped on his planes will arrive at Havana-area destinations in three days and anywhere else on the island in seven days. The plane holds 19 seats, but he's scaling that back to nine to make room for cargo. Passenger flights will face only a 30 to 45 minute delay in Miami for a customs inspection, he said.

About a half-dozen travel agencies in the Tampa area will book flights to Cuba, but the planes leave from Miami. Curtis' flight will be the only one leaving locally.

"I think there's enough interest in the Tampa area to make (the charter service) go and make it go well," he said.

Cuba connections

Curtis thinks business will go so well, in fact, he expects to buy four more planes in a year. Tampa's connections to Cuba date back more than 100 years when Jose Marti shipped weapons from Ybor City back home to fight the independence war against Spain. Cuban cigar workers here donated their wages to pay for the fight.

Initially, he'll run flights at 17,000 feet on the twin-engine prop jet four days a week -- Friday through Monday.

If all goes well, he hopes to persuade federal officials to let him skip the customs stop in Miami and fly directly from the St. Petersburg-Clearwater airport to Havana. It's a near straight shot about 310 miles south that he estimates would take an hour and 15 minutes in the air.

That won't happen anytime soon, federal officials say. Only Miami, Los Angeles and New York make the list of "gateway" cities to Cuba.

"There are no plans right now to add to the number of gateway cities," said Tony Fratto, spokesman for the U.S. Treasury Department in the Office of Foreign Assets Control, which issues the licenses.

"There are lots of concerns. One of those is if you open up a new gateway city, it requires a lot more resources (for customs and security) at that airport and in those cities. And also it's a question of need."

There's definitely a need, said Elaine Smalling, spokeswoman for St. Petersburg-Clearwater airport. Since word got out this summer about her airport's first scheduled service to Cuba, her phone has been ringing steadily.

"I think it will be a service that is invaluable, not only to family members but people who work with church groups that provide support and to educators and media that need to get to Cuba for legitimate business," she said. "Whoever does come to the table first with the service is going to be very successful if they do it right."

Bolstered service to Cuba, the Caribbean and the rest of Latin America factor into the long-range plans for Tampa International Airport, said spokeswoman Brenda Geoghagan.

"We are in a great location for that service (to Cuba)," Geoghagan said. She thinks Curtis is smart to start off small to test the market. The last regular service to Cuba from TIA started in 1946 by National Airlines, direct to Havana. But since the 1959 revolution, no regular service for Cuba has left the airport.

That's because it's so difficult, says Marta Reyes. She's a travel agent with McEwen Travel in Tampa who has handled travel arrangements to Cuba through Miami in the past.

'I hope it comes through'

The big airlines that operate charters to Cuba do so in Miami, a gateway city, to guarantee a full plane. To fly from Tampa to Miami, large carriers charge a regular fare. Then passengers pay another fare from Miami to Havana, Reyes said.

"It's such a short haul from here to Miami, the domestic carriers will not negotiate any type of add-on fair," she said. "It's not profitable for them."

A round trip from Tampa to Cuba through Miami could cost a traveler anywhere from $400 to $900, she said. Curtis said he plans to be competitive with Miami flights to Cuba, possibly charging up to $500. Some charters fly Miami-Cuba round-trip for $300 to $400.

For the smaller startup businesses, such as Curtis' Air MarBrisa, the service is costly, Reyes said. The business has to buy the plane, the insurance and go through reams of red tape to get approval.

"It could be profitable in the long run, but initially you take the risk," she said.

Tony Morejon, Hispanic affairs liaison for Hillsborough County, has heard horror stories of Cubans driving to the Miami airport with heavy packages, only to turn back around for Tampa when the flight got canceled.

"I don't know about five planes flying all the time, but there are plenty of people that want to go," he said about Curtis' plans.

Maura Barrios, adviser of Cuban studies within the Latin American and Caribbean Studies program at University of South Florida, said it "would be wonderful" if student groups and faculty that travel to Cuba under USF's license could leave locally.

For Bande of Safety Harbor, the service is overdue. Bande came to the United States as a teenager to work long before the 1959 revolution. He last visited in early 1959, just after Castro rolled into Havana from his guerrilla revolt in the mountains. Bande never went back, not able to afford it and fearing he might be detained. He and his wife tried to go through Miami last year. But travel delays pushed their departure so far back that his wife's visa expired -- something they only discovered after standing in line a few hours.

"I hope it comes through, I tell you," Bande said. "We're on pins and needles here."

-- Times researcher Catherine Wos contributed to this report.

At a glance

Legal travel to Cuba is restricted to:

-- People with relatives there

-- Students

-- Educators

-- Professionals such as journalists, doctors and athletes

-- Those visiting through cultural exchange programs

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Lucy Morgan

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