On Tuesday the 27th of August 2019
the Uganda Airlines (UA) started its maiden flight on route to Nairobi Kenya. The
maiden flight was for a selected people who included technical officers,
government officials, and members of the media according to the ministry of
Works and Transport spokesperson.
The flight departed from
Entebbe Airport for Jomo Kenyatta International Airport (JKIA) at 10:00am.
The Uganda Airlines
officially takes to the skies on Wednesday, for the first time in nearly 18
years for Mogadishu Somalia its most booked route out of its four initial
destinations. Mogadishu is then followed by Nairobi, whose bookings are also
fast coming in.
The scheduled flights for
the national carrier will start with flights to Nairobi, Dar-es Salaam, Juba
and Mogadishu of which the first flight is expected to leave Entebbe at 6.00am
and land at Jomo Kenyatta International Airport, Nairobi then the Mogadishu
flight will leave Entebbe at 5.37pm and land at Aden Adde International Airport
at 8:00pm according to the Uganda Airlines commercial director more clients
have booked the Mogadishu flight more than any other because Uganda has a
relatively large Somali community living in Kampala, many of whom are keen to
travel to their homeland plus also carry out trade.
The Uganda Airlines is
currently the only airline flying direct from Entebbe to Mogadishu. And with
time, the number of flights from Entebbe to Mogadishu will increase from the
current four a week to six a week.
The revived airline also
has plans to have two daily flights to Nairobi and Juba, and one daily flight
to Dar es Salaam, which will be plied by four Bombardier CRJ 900s aircraft. The
carrier also plans to increase the number of destinations to include Bujumbura
(three times weekly), Mombasa (three times weekly), and Kilimanjaro (daily) and
other destinations like Harare, Accra, Lusaka and Johannesburg will also be
added later.
Uganda Airlines recently
released promotional rates that will run for two months: Return tickets cost
$278 for Nairobi, $225 for Juba, $590 for Mogadishu, $286 for Dar es Salaam,
$292 for Bujumbura, $325 for Mombasa and $311 for Kilimanjaro plus the government
has also made a down payment of Ush74 billion ($20 million) on two Airbus
A330-800 Neos, which will be used for long haul flights and are expected to be
in the country between 2020 and 2021 which will introduce the airline to the
long haul routes of Europe, China, India and the Middle East.
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