Advertisement

Chad flies locally with Ethiopian

Tuesday October 16 2018
et

An Ethiopian Airlines Boeing 787 Dreamliner arrives at Kaduna airport, Nigeria March 8, 2017. Chad's national carrier has started its domestic flights using a Bombardier Dash 8-400 aircraft chartered from Ethiopian Airlines. PHOTO | REUTERS

By Allan Olingo

Chad's national carrier has started its domestic operations using a Bombardier Dash 8-400 aircraft chartered from Ethiopian Airlines — which owns a 49 per cent stake in the carrier — as it awaits the delivery of a second Q400 later this month.

Tchadia Airlines, which is 51 per cent owned by government, made its inaugural flight on October 1.

Tchadia flew to Abéché in the east of the country, via Faya-Largeau and Sarh via Moundou, using the Bombadier Turboprop Q400 from Ethiopian Airlines.

The head of Chad’s Civil Aviation Authority Mahamat Adjam said that ET had released one of the Q400s on September 29, ET-AQE to N'Djamena. It will serve four main cities in the country.

The second aircraft will serve regional routes in Central and West Africa, including Bangui in the Central African Republic, Douala in Cameroon, Kano in Nigeria, Khartoum in Sudan and Niamey in Niger.

Tchadia Airlines’ entry into the Central African region comes at a time Air Congo, the state-owned carrier of the Congo Republic, is also ramping up its operations there, with an announcement last week that it was in talks with China to acquire additional aircraft.

Advertisement

“We are in talks with China’s state-run airframe maker Commercial Aircraft Corporation to purchase three new ARJ2s that we will use for our regional routes. This will add to our three Xi’an Aircraft Industry Group MA60s,” said Air Congo head of quality, safety and security, Michael Gollo.

Air Congo has been in the skies for just two months, having stopped its flights earlier in the year, due to lack of funding. It currently flies to more than 10 domestic destinations.

Advertisement