A shortage of gas needed to fly certain small aircraft has grounded some B.C. businesses and their customers.
Sara Langlois with Skydive Salmon Arm said her team learned about the shortage about two weeks ago.
“At the moment, we are shut down until the fuel situation gets sorted,” she told CBC’s Daybreak South host Chris Walker Tuesday morning.
She estimates it costs her business about $3,000 a day — however, she says the business only operates on weekends.
Avgas is the aviation fuel used in small piston, engine-powered aircraft, often used by private pilots and companies. Without it, these businesses can’t get off the ground.
Daybreak South4:54Nationwide shortage of aviation gas hurting some B.C. operators
Sara Langlois,the drop zone manager with Skydive Salmon Arm, explains how a shortage of aviation gas is affecting many local flight businesses that rely on the summer season for a bulk of their income and flying activities.
A spokesperson for Imperial Oil told CBC a “temporary operational issue” at an Edmonton refinery is causing the shortage, adding that no other products produced by the company have been affected.
They said they expect the situation to be resolved in early August.
But for some businesses, a resolution can’t come soon enough.
Angel Flight East Kootenay flies East Kootenay residents to Kelowna for medical appointments — for free. But with the lack of fuel availability, founder Brent Bidston said it’s costing the registered non-profit time and money.
Typically, they fuel up in Kelowna, with enough fuel to go to the East Kootenay and back. But Bidston said Avgas is not currently available to them at their two main airports, Kelowna and Cranbrook, so his team has to make an extra stop to gas up in Fairmont, an additional 20-minute flight north of Cranbrook, B.C.
“We are determined to keep this service going,” Bidston said.
The general manager of Principal Air, which offers flight training, charter flights and aircraft rentals, says that while they’re able to get fuel at their home base in Abbotsford, B.C., the price has skyrocketed from $2.45 per litre to $3.15 per litre as a result of the Avgas shortage.
“We are also unable to get fuel anywhere other than our home base since most other airports are either out of fuel or are restricting its sale to aircraft based on field or to a very small amount per purchase,” Mitchell Nosko said in an email to CBC.
As a result, he said, Principal Air can’t fly anywhere they’d need to refuel.
“This couldn’t come at a worse time as July, August and September are our busiest months,” Nosko said.
Fortunately, the B.C. Wildfire Service says it is not affected by the shortage, as it contracts turbine-powered aircraft, which do not run on Avgas.