National Post story
"Cabotage" is the rights of an airline to fly passengers between domestic destinations in a country.
Long story short, under existing open skies agreements, regular Canadian airline flights can only go to one US city before returning to Canada. Sports teams were exempt for obvious reasons, one being the very nature of their profession and two because they were using charter flights.
The U.S. Air Line Pilots Association demanded an investigation of passenger lists on NHL hockey flights to uncover violations -- that being the addition and subtraction of new passengers while making stops within the United States.
So now the U.S. Department of Transportation isn't going to allow the exemption anymore, which in addition to sports teams also affects musicians on tour.
If the Calgary Flames are playing a west coast road trip, they would have to fly to Phoenix, fly back to Calgary so they could fly to Los Angeles, then fly back to Calgary to they could fly to San Jose.
If the Blue Jays are on an east coast road trip, a player gets injured and a minor leaguer gets called up to replace him and flies with the team from Tampa to Boston, they violate the rule.
"Cabotage" is the rights of an airline to fly passengers between domestic destinations in a country.
Long story short, under existing open skies agreements, regular Canadian airline flights can only go to one US city before returning to Canada. Sports teams were exempt for obvious reasons, one being the very nature of their profession and two because they were using charter flights.
The U.S. Air Line Pilots Association demanded an investigation of passenger lists on NHL hockey flights to uncover violations -- that being the addition and subtraction of new passengers while making stops within the United States.
So now the U.S. Department of Transportation isn't going to allow the exemption anymore, which in addition to sports teams also affects musicians on tour.
If the Calgary Flames are playing a west coast road trip, they would have to fly to Phoenix, fly back to Calgary so they could fly to Los Angeles, then fly back to Calgary to they could fly to San Jose.
If the Blue Jays are on an east coast road trip, a player gets injured and a minor leaguer gets called up to replace him and flies with the team from Tampa to Boston, they violate the rule.