(Photo: Pixabay)
Joyce Meyer Ministries’ Gulfstream G4 jet flew to Nepal in January for a mission trip celebrating the grand opening of a church building in Attarkhel, Nepal which was funded by its donors.
Hand of Hope, the disaster relief organization and mission outreach of Joyce Meyer Ministries, also funded the drilling of a water well and provided a health clinic for the community.
Hand of Hope operates as an integrated auxiliary of Joyce Meyer Ministries, and for this reason, is not required to file a Form 990 which would disclose salaries and financial information that religious watchdog organizations are interested in reviewing.
During the mission trip the ministry jet accumulated approximately 35.5 flight hours as it circled the globe.
The jet departed on January 14th from Spirit of Saint Louis Airport and landed in Manchester, England. The first leg of the trip to Nepal took 7 hours and 50 minutes.
(Photo: First travel day)
After a ten-hour break, the jet departed for Dubai, United Arab Emirates, and landed after flying 7 hours and 13 minutes. The jet was on the ground for a little over an hour, providing time for the jet to refuel.
(Photo: Second travel day)
Then the jet made the final leg of the trip to reach Nepal. Because the tracking map is incomplete (only two hours and 17 minutes of the flight was tracked), the exact amount of flight time is unknown. During the two hours the jet was not tracked, it may have landed at Nijgadh, Nepal, before traveling to Siddhartanagar, Nepal.
On January 22nd, the jet departed from Nepal. Again, the tracking map is incomplete (see photo below) so the total travel time for the return flights is unknown. It is also likely a brief stop was made at another Nepal airport before leaving the country.
After flying at least five hours and six minutes, the jet landed in Tokoname City, Japan. After being grounded for 56 minutes, the jet departed for Anchorage Alaska. The flight to Anchorage took six hours and 57 minutes.
(Photo: Day one of return flights)
(Photo: Day two of return flights.)
After being grounded for almost 90 minutes, the jet departed on the final flight from Anchorage to Saint Louis which took five hours and 27 minutes, arriving on January 23rd.
The total tracked travel time is 34 hours and 50 minutes. Taking into incomplete maps, and adding 40 minutes for additional flying time, which is a conservative estimate, the total estimated flight time would be 35.5 hours.
It is challenging to accurately estimate the travel expenses because of unknown variables. Aircraft cost calculators frequently include estimated annual payments for a jet; however, Joyce Meyer Ministries may have purchased the jet with cash.
In 2021, My Aircraft Cost estimated that a Gulfstream GIV flown for 450 hours with fuel costing $4.25 per gallon would cost $5,691.09 to fly per hour.
According to Compare Private Planes, a Gulfstream GIV that travels for 200 hours has $564,836 fixed costs. In 2023, the Joyce Meyer Ministries jet flew for less than 100 hours. While a jet that flies for 200 hours will have a higher total traveling expense, a jet with fewer hours will have a higher hourly rate due to the distribution of costs.
If flying the Gulfstream GIV cost $6000 per hour to fly, then the cost for traveling by private jet on the Nepal mission trip would have been approximately $213,000.
Qatar Airlines provides round trip service to Kathmandu, Nepal, originating from various U.S. cities including Saint Louis with tickets ranging from roughly $1,800 economy to $4,100 business class. Using our conservative estimate of $213,000, at least 52 people could travel to Nepal and back for the amount spent using the ministry’s private jet if their travel costs were $6,000 per flight hour.
In 2022, Joyce Meyer Ministries generated $106,571,117 in revenue and spent $1,637,359 on travel expenses. Based on this information from the ministry’s audited financial statement, the ministry spent less than 2% of its revenue on travel.
When a ministry uses a luxury asset such as a private jet, it raises red flags and more unanswerable questions since the organization does not file the IRS form 990.
The Trinity Foundation Pastor Planes Project has also tracked ten flights to Stuart, Florida involving the ministry jet. The purpose of these flights is unknown.
If Meyer is using the jet for personal travel, she is required by law to either reimburse the ministry for use of the jet or to pay a tax on the personal flights.
Some ministries disclose this kind of information on Schedule J of the Form 990. As an example, Samaritan’s Purse reported for 2022, “Portions of two board members’ trips were personal. Value of travel expenses were imputed to and reported as taxable income.”
Joyce Meyer Ministries is encouraged to follow this example of filing a Form 990 and disclosing information not contained in its annual audited financial statements.