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NEW SWAZI AIRWAYS MAIDEN FLIGHT IN FEBRUARY

14/01/2016 04:53:00 BY MUSA SIMELANE

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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.

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Comments (4 posted):

Rob Markwell on 14/01/2016 09:45:49

This article is very misleading. I am a licence aircraft engineer working for the UK CAA. I am originally born and raised in Swaziland. The aircraft stated does not have the capacity as stated in the article. The Dubai flight takes roughly eight hours from Joburg. I am tired of seeing the Swazi people lied too. Contact me to discuss this further and how Swaziland might be able to attract international carriers bringing much needed tourists to the beautiful kingdom.

Burns Dlamini (Lobhoncela) on 14/01/2016 10:07:38

Here is another mistake in the making. And this time I think we should fire cabinet when it fails, which it will. Its time this government was made accountable for the injudicious decisions it makes. The RSNA has lost money for this nation before and will again this time - draining government coffers. My point is; there is nothing majestic about that, its all about throwing good money after bad, period. If they wanted to test the routes for viability, why didn't they rent / lease a plane to ply the routes and only commit to buying one when the routes have been proven reliable? Cutting 12 hour flights to 9 is connmendable, but question is where is the traffic going to come from? Obviously, much of the traffic would be destined for Jozi, how I wish the plane would stop over there.

Ray Luca on 14/01/2016 10:10:14

Not sure which Airlines take "12 to 14 " Hours to fly to Dubai.

Emirates does Jhb- DXB in no later than 8 hours; depending on weather and traffic.

Nhlanhla on 14/01/2016 10:53:02

Ewu! its been a while we have indiza in Swaziland Thank you Mpangazitha. Besekutfusa kutsi sine Airport but site indiza. Halala Swaziland.