Air Antilles

If you have vacationed on Guadeloupe, Martinique or St. Barth in the past twenty years, you know the picture: an ATR with “Air Antilles” titles taking off from Pointe-à-Pitre, or a small Twin Otter floating in just over the hill onto the runway at St. Barth. Since April 2026 Air Antilles is history. This page shows you how the regional airline of the French Antilles worked, which aircraft it flew and how to classify archive photos correctly.

Air Antilles at a glance

Air Antilles was a French regional airline headquartered in Pointe-à-Pitre on Guadeloupe. Its job was clearly defined: to connect the islands of the French Antilles with one another and with neighboring islands in the Caribbean. There was never long-haul service to Paris at Air Antilles – that was left to Air France, Air Caraïbes and Corsair.

The airline made its first flight on December 18, 2002, then still under the name Air Antilles Express. It was the Caribbean brand of Air Guyane and belonged to the CAIRE group. The idea: inexpensive island connections with small turboprops, where large jets do not fit or do not pay off.

The most important bases were Pointe-à-Pitre Airport on Guadeloupe and Fort-de-France on Martinique. Most recently Air Antilles served only four destinations: Guadeloupe, Martinique, Grand Case on the French side of Saint-Martin and Saint-Barthélemy. In better times the network reached much further – including Antigua, Barbados, Dominica, St. Lucia, Puerto Rico, the Dominican Republic and Sint Maarten.

Codes and callsign

With Air Antilles you have to keep two eras apart:

• Until 2023: IATA 3S, ICAO GUY. As a brand of Air Guyane, Air Antilles shared its codes with its sister from French Guiana. On old tracker records the flights therefore appear under GUY, even when an ATR took off in Guadeloupe.
• From 2024: IATA 4I, ICAO KES. With the new air operator certificate the airline got its own codes. According to reference works it called in on the radio with the callsign “KARIBEES”.

For your logbook that means: the code tells you which phase a sighting comes from. How IATA and ICAO codes work in general is explained in the article IATA and ICAO codes explained. Why flight number and callsign are not the same, you can read in Callsign vs. flight number.

History: two lives under one name

Air Antilles Express in the CAIRE group (2002–2023)

The first years were dominated by the CAIRE group, which also ran the connections in French Guiana with Air Guyane. Air Antilles Express grew into a dense island network with ATR 42s and Twin Otters. At the end of January 2017 the first ATR 72-600, with the registration F-OMYM, arrived in Guadeloupe. With it the airline wanted to increase frequencies and open new routes, for example to Barbados, Antigua and Tortola. During this period the brand increasingly appeared only as Air Antilles.

In summer 2023 the situation tipped. On July 14, 2023, the group’s pilots went on strike, and the CAIRE companies slid into insolvency. In early August the commercial court in Pointe-à-Pitre opened liquidation proceedings with temporary continuation of operations.

Restart with Saint-Martin and Edeis (2023–2025)

In September 2023 the court approved a partial takeover: the Collectivité de Saint-Martin took 60 percent, the French group Edeis 40 percent. Air Guyane was not part of the deal.

It took almost a year until the first flight of its own. In 2024 the airline received a new air operator certificate and new codes. The first thing to resume, from early July 2024, was service to St. Barth – though with a Twin Otter that Air Antilles had wet-leased, crew included, from Swiss operator Zimex Aviation. Its own flight operations started on July 22, 2024, with the ATR 72-600 F-OMYM on the route Fort-de-France–Pointe-à-Pitre–Saint-Martin, a week later than planned because pilot approvals were missing.

The end (2025–2026)

Economically the new Air Antilles never really got going. Legacy burdens from its predecessor, few passengers and a small active fleet weighed on the books. According to media reports, the Collectivité de Saint-Martin had put more than 20 million euros into the company since the takeover. In 2024 the airline reportedly carried only about 35,000 passengers.

On December 8, 2025, the French aviation authority DGAC suspended the air operator certificate for safety reasons after an audit, because it found significant deficiencies. From December 18, 2025, IATA excluded the airline from the BSP France billing system, and travel agencies could no longer sell tickets. In January 2026 insolvency followed, and on February 2, 2026, restructuring proceedings. No viable buyer was found: on April 27, 2026, the commercial court of Pointe-à-Pitre ordered liquidation. 116 employees were affected, and liabilities stood at more than 56 million euros according to reports.

The fleet: ATR and Twin Otter

Air Antilles was a pure turboprop airline. The fleet changed over the years but always followed the same principle: larger ATRs for the routes between the main islands, small Twin Otters for the short runway at St. Barth.

Type	Period	Seats	Use	Spotter note
ATR 42-500	CAIRE era	n/a	Island network	Three aircraft in the fleet in 2017
ATR 42-600	CAIRE era and restart	approx. 48	Island network	Glass cockpit, outwardly hard to tell from the -500
ATR 72-600	from 2017	72	Main islands Guadeloupe, Martinique, Saint-Martin	F-OMYM as the first aircraft and workhorse after the restart
DHC-6-300 Twin Otter	CAIRE era	n/a	St. Barth	Two aircraft in the fleet in 2017
DHC-6-400 Twin Otter	Restart	19	St. Barth	Modern new edition of the Twin Otter

The ATR 72-600 was the largest aircraft Air Antilles ever operated. After the restart the airline listed two ATR 72-600s, one ATR 42-600 and one Twin Otter on its website. According to the trade press, though, only F-OMYM was active in July 2024; the other ATRs sat parked in Pointe-à-Pitre or in Morocco. The manufacturer of the ATR family is ATR in Toulouse.

The ATR 42-600 and its predecessor, the ATR 42-500, shaped the network in the CAIRE years. They offer fewer seats and so suited the smaller neighboring islands well.

The DHC-6 Twin Otter was the specialist tool. Originally built by De Havilland Canada, it is now being produced again as the Series 400. With its 19 seats, fixed landing gear and short takeoff and landing distances, it is made for places like St. Barth.

ATR 42 or ATR 72? How to tell them apart

In photos from Pointe-à-Pitre both ATR sizes often stand side by side. With a few features you can place them.

Telling the -500 from the -600 on the ATR 42 gets you little from the outside – the key difference is in the cockpit. Registration and date are your surest route here. For the basics of telling aircraft types apart, see the guide How to recognize aircraft types, and for propeller aircraft specifically the article How to tell turboprops apart. And because turboprops have their own rules when it comes to photography: the article Photographing propellers shows you which shutter speed makes the propellers visibly spin.

How to recognize Air Antilles

In photos you recognize Air Antilles first and foremost by the titles on the fuselage. In the early years the airline ran as “Air Antilles Express”, later only as “Air Antilles” – the name helps you date a photo. Then there is the registration: aircraft based in France’s overseas territories mostly carry an F-O registration, such as F-OMYM or F-OMYS. What is behind the prefixes is explained in the articles Understanding aircraft registrations and Country codes on aircraft.

The third feature is the type: Air Antilles never had jets. If you see a jet with a French registration in Guadeloupe or Martinique, it is a different airline.

Air Antilles at St. Barth

The connection to Saint-Barthélemy was the airline’s flagship – and the most exciting part for spotters. Gustaf III Airport has a very short runway, squeezed between a hill and Saint-Jean beach. On approach to runway 10 the aircraft clear the road at the Col de la Tourmente by only a small margin and then drop steeply onto the runway. Anyone standing there has one of the best-known photo spots in the Caribbean in front of them – more on the page about the Col de la Tourmente at St. Barth and in the article Plane spotting at St. Barth.

Only small aircraft capable of short takeoffs are suited to this airport. Air Antilles therefore used the Twin Otter, while the ATRs took over the longer routes. The island is not among the most spectacular airports in the world for nothing.

August 24, 2023, showed how demanding the conditions are: the Twin Otter F-OMYS veered left off the runway on landing on runway 28 and slammed into a parked, empty helicopter. There were no fatalities, but the aircraft was badly damaged. According to the final report of the BEA investigation authority from March 2026, the cable tension of the nose wheel steering was too low, so the nose wheel could twist in flight. In addition, the crew was unaware of changed inspection procedures from the manufacturer for the nose wheel steering.

Spotting the Antilles today

Even without Air Antilles, a spotting trip to the region is worthwhile. Between Guadeloupe, Martinique and Saint-Martin it is mainly Air Caraïbes flying ATR 72-600s, and on long-haul there are Air France, Air Caraïbes and Corsair from Paris. To St. Barth, small turboprops of other operators keep flying, such as Winair from Sint Maarten.

Sint Maarten also has Maho Beach, where large jets on approach pass just over the beach. A combination of Maho Beach and St. Barth is one of the dream tours for many spotters. In tropical light the sun stands very high at midday – plan your photos for the morning or late afternoon instead. How to do that is shown in the article Planning sun position.

Common mix-ups

• Confusing Air Antilles with Air Caraïbes – both come from Guadeloupe and flew ATR 72-600s, but Air Caraïbes also operates long-haul Airbus jets to Paris.
• Thinking Air Antilles is an active airline – it stopped flying in December 2025 and was liquidated in April 2026.
• Filing old photos under 4I/KES – before 2024 Air Antilles flew under 3S/GUY.
• Treating Air Antilles and Air Guyane as the same – the sister from French Guiana shared the codes until 2023 but was not taken over.
• Thinking the Twin Otter was its own aircraft – for the 2024 restart, a Twin Otter wet-leased from Zimex Aviation initially flew at St. Barth.
• Telling the ATR 42-500 and -600 apart by looks – outwardly they are hard to distinguish, so the registration is safer.

Conclusion

For two decades Air Antilles was the link between the French Antilles – unspectacular with the ATR between Guadeloupe and Martinique, spectacular with the Twin Otter over the Col de la Tourmente. After the insolvency of the CAIRE group there was a second chance with Saint-Martin and Edeis, but safety deficiencies, debts and too few passengers ended this attempt as well. For spotters the airline remains a chapter in the archive, where date, code and registration decide the correct classification.