(Posted 02nd November 2026)
Sudan Airways has suspended all flights after withdrawing its only aircraft, an A320-200 (MSN 3040 | ST-MKW), from service over a technical malfunction on 30th of October.
Flight trackers show ST-MKW to still be in Khartoum.
Meanwhile, the state-owned carrier has cancelled all bookings on flights scheduled for the aircraft, including the Cairo-Khartoum service. Sudan Airways’ network connects Khartoum to Port Sudan, Jeddah, and Cairo.
The required spare part was unavailable inside Sudan, preventing immediate repairs.
Sudan Airways removed the aircraft from service to comply with aviation safety standards and avoid passenger risk.
The airline expects to resume regular flights this week once the part is obtained and the fault is fixed.
Sudan’s Ministry of Transport has repeatedly claimed Sudan Airways is in the process of obtaining more aircraft. However, to date, none have arrived with no firm announcement made on contracted deliveries.
Sudan Airways is no longer subject to a comprehensive US trade embargo, which was lifted in 2017, when the carrier was removed from the OFAC SDN list. The troubled North African state was taken off the US State Sponsor of Terrorism list in 2020.
However, a national emergency related to Sudan remains in force. New US measures under the Chemical and Biological Weapons Control and Warfare Elimination Act took effect in 2025–2026 after Washington DC found the government had used chemical weapons in its ongoing war with the rebel Rapid Support Forces (RSF). These include tighter export restrictions and a ban on Sudanese state-owned airlines operating to or from the United States. The flight ban is largely symbolic, as Sudan Airways has never ran transatlantic services.
Despite this measure, an exemption continues to permit licences for spare parts and technical services required for the safe operation of civilian passenger aircraft.
Correspondent banks and commercial intermediaries continue to apply heightened compliance checks on Sudanese entities which can delay or block settlement of payments for aircraft, spare parts or leases even when the underlying transaction is permissible.
