Not long after the massive earthquake laid waste to Haiti on January 12, the general aviation infrastructure in the U.S. mounted some of
the earliest relief efforts. Accounts of flights carrying doctors, aid workers, medical supplies and food to Haiti are legion, as donors from all over the world funneled supplies to the devastated country through airports in South Florida.
According to the U.S. Air Force– which assumed control of Port-au-Prince’s airport soon after the disaster at the request of the Haitian government–40 percent of the aircraft that have landed there since the airport reopened on January 14 have been U.S. civil registered, the vast majority of them general aviation airplanes. Statistics from flight tracking provider FlightAware show more than 600 general aviation flights heading to Port-au-Prince from the U.S. in the month following the disaster; more than double that number headed for Santo Domingo in the Dominican Republic, as the airport there became a staging ground for the delivery of supplies.
