Brazilian airline RIMA joins ALTA

A new company joins ALTA's group of member airlines. This time it is RIMA Aviação, the sixth airline to receive the IATA Standard Safety Assessment (ISSA) certification under the ALTA / IATA Program.
 
RIMA is a Brazilian company with 19 years of service in passenger and cargo transportation, mainly in the states of Rondônia, Acre, Amazonas and Roraima. It was created in November 2001 with the purpose of serving the northern region of the country, specifically the Western Amazon, with its main base in Porto Velho and operational bases in Manaus and Labrea.
 
ALTA Executive Director & CEO, José Ricardo Botelho, gave the airline an effusive welcome: “I am very happy to welcome RIMA, another Brazilian airline that joins ALTA, demonstrating once again the effort to carry the campaigns from ALTA to all corners of the region and, especially, to Brazil. RIMA goes beyond a successful outcome of the ISSA Program, started in June 2018, to expand the region's airlines' access to the training necessary to obtain certification. We demonstrate that safety is the number one priority in the industry and that there is a strong desire that more and more operators obtain their certification, contribute to expanding the air network and bring the benefits of aviation to more places in Latin America and the Caribbean".
 
ISSA is a voluntary assessment program, developed at the request of the industry, to extend the safety and efficiency benefits of the IATA Operational Safety Audit (IOSA) to operators of smaller aircraft, who are not eligible for the IOSA program.
 
On October 28, 2019, RIMA received its ISSA certification from the directors of ALTA and IATA, thus consolidating its continuous effort to seek the safety and efficiency of its operations. The owner and CEO of RIMA, Gilberto Scheffer, expressed his satisfaction to join ALTA: “It is a great honor to be part of this association of great importance for the development of Aviation in Latin America and we are eager to collaborate with the goal of ALTA . With RIMA's tradition and experience in operations in the Western Amazon, we can join more regions to the national and international network ”.
 
During the critical period of the COVID-19 pandemic, RIMA flights contributed to the fight against the health crisis, transporting patients, medicines, PPE and sanitation material, reinforcing RIMA's social role in the Amazon region of Brazil. RIMA operates aeromedical flights from the Amazon to all of Brazil since 2013, transporting patients who need specialized medical care.
 
“Developing capillarity by creating routes and services to isolated destinations is essential for the growth of aviation and to bring economic and social benefits to more places in the region, especially now that we need it so much. RIMA's contribution to connecting the northern region of Brazil with the rest of the country is of fundamental importance for Brazilian aviation and, in this way, ensuring that more Brazilians access the opportunities generated by aviation and tourism ”, concluded Botelho.