KENYA’S ATC INFLICTS MORE PAIN ON AIRLINES
Kenya’s aviation primadonnas, aka air traffic controllers, have once again decided to move from regular work to slow go, inflicting some serious pain on travelers and the airlines flying within Kenya but also the international carriers coming to Nairobi.
As reported recently, such measures keep piling up delays in particular on national carrier Kenya Airways, where tight schedules now find themselves wrecked across the day with compound delays every time a flight either has to land or take off in Nairobi, Mombasa Malindi, Eldoret and Kisumu.
‘For once the travelers cannot blame the airlines for delays because this is all the doing of ATC. Like previously, they ambushed the airlines and KCAA pressing for their demands to be met. I wonder at times if employers and employees still ever talk to each other because these days we see one strike after the next here in Kenya. And it has also become unpredictable because one day they work like normal and then we wake up and first thing in the morning they cause delays of an hour already. Let me wind them up a little here, they are committing an environmental crime every time they keep a jet on the taxiway for half an hour or longer, because it burns fuel and adds to global warming. Have they even thought of that damage the cause over and above the cost they inflict on airlines with people missing connections? asked a regular source from JKIA in Nairobi, after the problems re-emerged since Monday this week.
Airline officials contacted were understandable reserved with their comments but he underlying message was that KCAA needed to address some of the issues, like staffing levels and shift hours to ensure continued safe operations in Kenya’s airspace. Watch this space for regular and breaking news from East Africa’s aviation scene.
