Times Of Swaziland: NEW SWAZI AIRWAYS MAIDEN FLIGHT IN FEBRUARY

NEW SWAZI AIRWAYS MAIDEN FLIGHT IN FEBRUARY
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BY MUSA SIMELANE on 14/01/2016 04:53:00


EZULWINI – The highly anticipated new Swazi Airways airline, a Boeing 737-500,
will take to the skies in the first week of February, it has been revealed.
It will be bound for Durban, South Africa for that week before getting in all
the routes that have been set by the airline company, which is a subsidiary of
the Royal Swaziland National Airways Corporation (RSNAC). It is wholly owned by
government.
This transpired at a meeting hosted by the company to share information with
stakeholders and also get their immediate feedback.
The acting Chief Executive Officer (CEO), Guillermo Barrios, who is a Venezuelan
Canadian, said the Durban route would be a test followed by Cape Town. It will
take no more than two hours to fly to the latter. After that, the plane will
make its way to Harare, Zimbabwe. But the major destination will be Dubai in the
United Arab Emirates (UAE), where the airline will take nine hours instead of
the normal 12 to 14 hours by other airlines.
Other planned destinations in the long term include Mumbai in Indian and the
island of Seychelles, which will mostly be a pit-stop. South America too is in
the picture. The slogan of Swazi Airways is ‘The majestic wings of
Swaziland’.
Explaining the timetable, Barrios said the plane would fly twice a day, so on
Mondays it will fly to Harare and Cape Town, on Tuesday to Durban and Dubai, on
Wednesday return from Dubai to KMIII International Airport (Sikhuphe) and then
to Durban. On Thursday it will fly to Cape Town and Harare.
Sunday will be a day for maintenance and technical check-up. As for the route to
Johannesburg, Barrios said the company was still waiting for authorisation as
they were also interested in it.
“We plan to add more flights as we see an increase in the passenger traffic.
Part of this meeting is to do a survey on which destinations stakeholders would
be interested in. History does show that the passenger traffic has always been
on the low side, but we plan to attract tourists, investors and so on to change
this,” said the CEO.