KENYAN AVIATION AUTHORITIES YIELD TO TOURISM INDUSTRY PRESSURE
(Posted 10th September 2018)
In a long overdue development has Kenya apparently granted traffic rights to Qatar Airways.
The airline had twice before attempted to launch flights to the Kenyan port city but found themselves at the receiving end of objections at the last minute, prompting them to withdraw their interest.
The flights are due to commenceon the 11th of December with initially four daily frequencies, using a two class Airbus A330 on the route with 12 seats in their award winning business class and only 120 seats in economy class, providing one of the most passenger friendly cabin environments on the market.
The flights will operate every Tuesday, Thursday, Saturday and Sunday, arriving in Mombasa at 08.40 hrs and leaving back for Doha at 16.50 hrs, allowing for excellent connectivity at the QR hub both ways into their global network.
This development, and it can only be hoped that the Kenyan authorities will not throw another spanner in the works at the 11th hour, will bring the number of scheduled foreign airlines flights to four, joining RwandAir, Ethiopian Airlines and Turkish Airlines.
Qatar Airways flies already three times a week to Nairobi and elsewhere in the region serves Entebbe and Kigali daily while in Tanzania operating to Kilimanjaro, Dar es Salaam and Zanzibar.
Encouraged by this development is Kenya’s tourism industry now expected to step up the pressure on their government to grant Ethiopian Airlines landing rights in Malindi, which airport is capable to handle Bombardier Q400 flights. This would further boost Kenya’s chances to make a fuller recovery from the downturn seen earlier in the decade when the Kenya coast lost much of its appeal and lustre to other beach destinations.
A further update will be provided later in the week due to ongoing travels which make regular news reports difficult at best.
