Seychelles gets new Dornier aerial surveillance aircraft

SEYCHELLES BOOSTS AERIAL SURVEILLANCE CAPACITY WITH NEW PLANE

The Seychelles government has over the weekend taken formal delivery of a brand new Dornier surveillance aircraft, built in India and donated by the Indian government to the Seychelles as part of their bilateral assistance.

For the last nearly two years was an Indian airforce Dornier deployed to the Seychelles to act as an airborne platform to carry out literally nonstop surveillance flights which then provided instant updates to the naval forces deployed in the Indian Ocean to combat ocean terrorism. Seychelles personnel was trained both on board, as pilots and technicians but also in aircraft maintenance and more pilots are currently undergoing training in India to then fly the new aircraft home in early March.

The Dornier will operated alongside a number of other aircraft operating out of Djibouti but also the Seychelles and an unspecified number of UAV’s, aka drones, which carry out aerial surveillance in different sectors of the Indian Ocean but fly out of the main Seychelles airport on Mahe.

Cruise tourism to the Seychelles has been boosted by strict security measures the government in Victoria has established, which among other activities also saw armed guards deployed on all ships transiting Seychellois waters or calling on Victoria. This initially controversial measure, a number of foreign countries and in particular misguided ‘civil rights activists’ there had raised issues on legalities and principle policy, proved highly successful and led to a sharp decline in ship-jackings as not one single ship with security on board has ever been captured by the Somali ocean terrorists. As a result has cruise tourism resumed operations in the Seychelles waters after a period of time when cruise lines decided to avoid the Indian Ocean, bringing in much needed extra revenues and helping the Seychelles to boost economic performance, which last year saw a new passenger record established. Watch this space for the news update when the aircraft will actually come ‘home’ to the Seychelles next month and resume operations.