“The safety and security of Americans abroad is probably my highest priority,” Mr. Rood said in answer to a question about the airport’s condition, “and there are safety concerns at this airport. The number one comment I hear as an ambassador from American citizens relates to this airport. Relates to safety issues; relates to delays; relates to the fact that it’s very limited to the type of aircraft that can come in here. I’ve expressed this on several occasions to the aviation minister, and I’m going to continue to do so.”
Explaining that this was his first visit to Abaco as an ambassador, Mr. Rood, who piloted the plane he arrived in on Wednesday morning, said he will now look at the airport with interest, adding, “so I’m going to continue to express our concern and I hope that something can be done.
Mr. Rood, who only just obtained his pilot’s licence last summer and flies with a co-pilot when travelling with passengers, for safety reasons, said of his arrival in Marsh Harbour, “There were several planes juggling for the first landing spot when I came in here.” He said his co-pilot advised him when landing that he “should keep pressure on the yoke because this is a bad runway and you don’t want your nose gear to have full weight on it. So that was a different experience for me. So I know what the pilots here face.”
Mr. Rood said, speaking strictly from a safety and efficiency stand point, in the long term, “my hope would be that there would be improvements to the runway. There could be a parallel taxiway put in, so that people won’t have to try juggling back-taxiing along with landing, and that could improve the safety tremendously. And again, that’s something that I’m going to take up with the aviation minister when I get back to Nassau.”
From a security standpoint, Mr. Rood said, “there are other issues. And those are being taken up between the TSA people, who handle airport security, and the aviation ministry, and will be worked through them, and I’m confident that that will be worked out.”
Mr. Rood also addressed issues such as improvements in his embassy’s issuance of visas to Bahamians; U.S. and Bahamian joint efforts in combating the illegal drug trade; and the role his office and U.S. citizens resident on Abaco can play in improving educational opportunities for Bahamians right here in The Bahamas, rather than risking adding to the “brain drain” by having them study abroad.
Ambassador Rood, who was accompanied by his press officer, Mike Taylor, spent Wednesday night in Hope Town, after speaking to the Cay Topics women’s organisation; reading “Anancy and Friends” to students at the Hope Town Primary School; and meeting with members of the American community there.
On Thursday, in addition to his Radio Abaco interview, the ambassador attended a special assembly of Central Abaco Primary School in Dundas Town, at which he read a book about the 1963 March on Washington for civil rights that was led by Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., a hero of Mr. Rood. The ambassador addressed a luncheon of the Abaco Chamber of Commerce in the afternoon.
