Modern Aviation Grows Presence At Isla Grande Airport

The dominant presence of a large fixed-base operator has not altered the small community feel at Puerto Rico’s Fernando Luis Ribas Dominicci Airport (SIG), also known as Isla Grande Airport.

“We’re basically just like a family,” says Carlos Diaz Holguin-Veras, customer service manager with FBO Modern Aviation at SIG. “We take care of every customer like they are part of our family,” he adds.

New York City-based Modern Aviation acquired the former Puerto Rico FBO at the airport in February 2024, a year before BCA’s visit, consolidating business jet services there. Modern had earlier acquired the operations of Hill Aviation, a Million Air franchisee, at SIG and Jose Aponte de la Torre Airport (RVR) in Ceiba, Puerto Rico. Hill had operated at SIG for 30 years.

Modern retained Hill Aviation’s employees. Some of its 40 employees have worked at the San Juan airport for 17-18 years, says Diaz Hoguin-Veras, himself a Hill Aviation veteran. Tommy Hill, whose father started that business, runs aircraft management company ProPilot—one of Modern Aviation’s largest customers.

General Manager Hector Vasquez had only recently retired when Modern Aviation persuaded him to join the company at SIG in May 2023. Vasquez had worked more than three decades for FBO Jet Aviation, mostly at Teterboro Airport in New Jersey, before moving to Puerto Rico in 2018. He was Jet Aviation’s FBO director and GM at San Juan’s Luis Muñoz Marin International Airport (SJU).

Vasquez now sees Jet Aviation San Juan as a competitor. “We are more concise to GA and private aircraft,” he says. “All of our tenants are living in Puerto Rico—they [Jet Aviation] take more transit aircraft than tenants.”

SIG is located in San Juan’s Isla Grande neighborhood southeast of historic Old San Juan. The airport is bounded to the north by the San Antonio Channel, a waterway used for berthing yachts, and to the southeast by a commercial area centered around the Puerto Rico Convention Center.

“If you go to the main airport, you’re going to waste time on the engine, you’re going to use more fuel,” Vasquez says. “What I try to sell here is: You land and take off in a timely manner.”

At SJU, “you have to wait for the airlines to take off,” he adds. “You have to contact ground departure, then you can taxi. Here, you contact ground to say you’re ready to taxi, then it’s less than 30 sec. to get to the end of the runway.”

Owned by the Ports Authority of Puerto Rico, SIG has a single, 5,539-ft. runway (09-27), an FAA contract tower and a U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) station. Pilots must obtain permission to land from CBP prior to departure from a foreign airport and at least one day in advance of the anticipated arrival time at SIG, the agency says.

The airport’s runway accommodates midsize to larger business jets, including Dassault Falcon 900, Gulfstream G550 and Bombardier Global models. Plans call for a $27.5 million reconstruction of the runway, funded by an Airport Improvement Program grant and $2.7 million from the Puerto Rico Ports Authority. The scope of work includes new airfield lighting, signage, stormwater drainage pipes and pavement markings.

After acquiring Hill Aviation in 2022, Modern Aviation invested $17 million in two new hangars. “We had paying customers lining up for them before they were built,” Vasquez says. With the acquisition of Puerto Rico FBO, located on the north side of the runway opposite Modern’s facility, the company now has five hangars with 152,458 ft.² of total space, 240,000 ft.² of ramp space and 6,694 ft.² of office space.

Modern Aviation also operates an FAA Part 145 repair station with 14 mechanics, most trained in Cessna Citation and Gulfstream types, and offers aircraft detailing.

The FBO plans to expand its fuel farm, which consists of two 12,000-gal. tanks, one for Jet A, the other for 100LL avgas. It offers full-service Jet A refueling with Prist fuel-system icing inhibitor as an option. “Right now, we’re getting truckloads … due to the volume we’re seeing at the airport since Modern arrived,” Vasquez says. Petro Air, a World Fuel subsidiary, supplies Modern at SIG.

Visiting the tropics has its allure, but Puerto Rico also sees the occasional hurricane. In August 2024, Hurricane Ernesto, a Category 1 tempest, brought high winds, heavy rain and power outages to the capital. Modern Aviation has a 72-hr. plan to prepare its facilities after being warned of a hurricane.

“We lock it down­—we start storing the aircraft,” says Diaz Holguin-Veras. “Our hangars are [built] on concrete. The worst that would happen to the building is that the paint would skim off.”

He estimates that Puerto Rico experiences three or four less powerful tropical storms each year, starting in May through October. “Last year was the exception,” says Diaz Holguin-Veras. “The crazy weather ended around November. Climate change has been working out really weird over the past couple of years.”