USADreamliner From , joined Dec 1969, posts, RR: Posted (6 years 1 month 2 weeks 3 days 21 hours ago) and read 2128 times:
This is from wikipedia ( not a reliable source, but anyway):
Angola's government has enjoyed a long, good relationship with the Cuban government. Seeking a connection with Latin American countries, the now private airline looked forward to starting flights to that Caribbean nation.
TAAG bought a Boeing 747 with this route in mind. When granted rights to fly to Cuba, TAAG gained the "distinction" of being the only African airline to fly to José Martí International Airport in Havana. The airline still uses the 747 on this route.
As far as I know, they don't fly to Cuba, at least not scheduled routes.
Any more information about this flights or when they operated this flights?
Latinplane From United States of America, joined Dec 1999, 2629 posts, RR: 15 Reply 2, posted (6 years 1 month 2 weeks 3 days 20 hours ago) and read 2037 times:
TAAG flew to Havana back in the 70s/80s, and early 90s,(I believe) and so did the airline from its sister country LAM Linhas Aereas de Mozambique. There was a lot of interaction with Cuba during the civil war in Angola. I've heard that many Cuban professors, doctors, and others in specialized fields were sent to Angola to assist with the organization of the country once Angola declared its independence from Portugal. Cuban workers reached very high numbers warranting the need for once every two-week service between the two points. Today, TAAG only maintains a sales office in Havana as a political gesture for all the help Angola received from Cuba when it was a very young nation.
LatinPlane
P.S. on Myaviation.net, you can search for a foto of a LAM Ill-86 parked on the tarmac of Havana
MD90fan From Bahamas, joined Jul 2005, 2931 posts, RR: 7 Reply 3, posted (6 years 1 month 2 weeks 3 days 20 hours ago) and read 2004 times:
Quoting Latinplane (Reply 2): TAAG flew to Havana back in the 70s/80s, and early 90s,(I believe) and so did the airline from its sister country LAM Linhas Aereas de Mozambique. There was a lot of interaction with Cuba during the civil war in Angola. I've heard that many Cuban professors, doctors, and others in specialized fields were sent to Angola to assist with the organization of the country once Angola declared its independence from Portugal. Cuban workers reached very high numbers warranting the need for once every two-week service between the two points. Today, TAAG only maintains a sales office in Havana as a political gesture for all the help Angola received from Cuba when it was a very young nation.
x2
Cuba also had soldiers in Angola aligned with the MPLA organacion. Since they were both comrades in the Communist world, Cuba found it in it's best interest to help the new Communist states in Africa at the time.
This was reflected by the sheer number of routes to Allied nations and rogue states purely for political reasons.
AirSpare From United States of America, joined Jun 2006, 589 posts, RR: 6 Reply 4, posted (6 years 1 month 2 weeks 3 days 19 hours ago) and read 1941 times:
First time I've uploaded photos so if I f it up, sorry.
Now TAAG....Reading local magazines of the T7 and 737 order, infrastructure upgrades, seeing the A/C parked here and Varig engineering techs around, does anyone want to speculate on a future fleet order for a few extra routes north and west?
Felipe, did you have a chance to browse the mags I sent? Got an opinion?
3201 From , joined Dec 1969, posts, RR: Reply 6, posted (6 years 1 month 2 weeks 3 days 19 hours ago) and read 1900 times:
Quoting Latinplane (Reply 2): TAAG flew to Havana back in the 70s/80s, and early 90s,(I believe) and so did the airline from its sister country LAM Linhas Aereas de Mozambique. There was a lot of interaction with Cuba during the civil war in Angola. I've heard that many Cuban professors, doctors, and others in specialized fields were sent to Angola to assist with the organization of the country once Angola declared its independence from Portugal. Cuban workers reached very high numbers warranting the need for once every two-week service between the two points.
I remember when I was a kid, late 70's/early 80's, I got my hands on a worldwide OAG, and was shocked to see amongst the few international flights to HAV, flights to some place in a country called Angola that I'd never heard of. I asked my parents about it and they explained the political situation. My memory says it was a weekly flight that alternated between the Angolan airline (was it still TAAG back then) with a 707 and Cubana with an Il-62 -- so each flew a round-trip every two weeks.
AirSpare From United States of America, joined Jun 2006, 589 posts, RR: 6 Reply 7, posted (6 years 1 month 2 weeks 3 days 19 hours ago) and read 1873 times:
MD90fan
Thanks for posting the pics, I have some more I'll upload on the next TAAG thread. I'm on a slooow dial up downtowm.
How about some speculatoin that TAAG could fill 4 787-8s?
One thing I could never figiue out why there isn't a there a national airlines rinning routes up the coast. Lack of open skies?
LipeGIG From Brazil, joined May 2005, 11200 posts, RR: 61 Reply 8, posted (6 years 1 month 2 weeks 3 days 17 hours ago) and read 1761 times:
AIRLINERS.NET CREW FORUM MODERATOR
Quoting AirSpare (Reply 4): Felipe, did you have a chance to browse the mags I sent? Got an opinion?
Yes Michael, thanks again. It's impressive the size of an economy that "borned" again just a couple of years ago. Probably is the country with more opportunities today for a lot of corporations !
Quoting AirSpare (Reply 7): How about some speculatoin that TAAG could fill 4 787-8s?
May be, IMO LAD could be an important connecting airport for some others closer countries and this could help TAAG to fly more to LIS, GIG, JNB and to begin flights to other markets like CDG, MAD and in the future a US regular route.
Felipe
New York + Rio de Janeiro = One of the best combinations !
Latinplane From United States of America, joined Dec 1999, 2629 posts, RR: 15 Reply 9, posted (6 years 1 month 2 weeks 3 days 9 hours ago) and read 1549 times:
Here is the pic I was talking about earlier. LAM - Linhas Aereas de Mozambique also flew tranatlantic services to Havana at the same time that Cubana de Aviacion flew its African revolutionary La Habana - Isla do Sal - Luanda - Maputo route. What an exotic route of the bigone era.
TAAG also flew its Luanda - Isla do Sal - La Habana flight with machinery produced by communist U.S.S.R., while at same time flying Boeing 707s on its other route to the Americas, the still running Luanda - Rio de Janeiro.
RAFVC10 From Spain, joined Sep 2005, 1980 posts, RR: 8 Reply 11, posted (6 years 1 month 2 weeks 2 days 22 hours ago) and read 1314 times:
Well, not many years ago (about ten or twelve years) I remember Cubana had a weekly flight from HAV to LAD and MPM with stop in SID.
They used to operate IL62 equipment.
But I must to recognise that I don't remember TAAG operating to Cuba... only to Rio de Janeiro with 743 equipment (when I had notices about these flights, I remember I was shocked!)
El dia que los gilipollas vuelen, no podremos ver la luz del sol!
Airbazar From United States of America, joined Sep 2003, 6863 posts, RR: 7 Reply 12, posted (6 years 1 month 2 weeks 2 days 18 hours ago) and read 1238 times:
IIRC LAM never flew to Cuba regularly. Those pictures are most likely charters that were used to carry Cuban professionals and aid to Mozambique, or Mozambican students to go study in Cuba.
B747-437B From , joined Dec 1969, posts, RR: Reply 13, posted (6 years 1 month 2 weeks 2 days 18 hours ago) and read 1212 times:
Quoting MD90fan (Reply 5): First and foremost, Angola possess the World's fastest economy and last year it's GDP grew by 20%.
Lets not lose sight of the fact that despite all this, Angola remains one of the most depressing places in Africa and without a doubt the most bureaucratic and corrupt by far. And this comes from someone who has worked all over the continent from Liberia to Kenya to South Africa to Nigeria.
MD90fan From Bahamas, joined Jul 2005, 2931 posts, RR: 7 Reply 14, posted (6 years 1 month 2 weeks 2 days 16 hours ago) and read 1143 times:
Quoting B747-437B (Reply 13): Lets not lose sight of the fact that despite all this, Angola remains one of the most depressing places in Africa and without a doubt the most bureaucratic and corrupt by far. And this comes from someone who has worked all over the continent from Liberia to Kenya to South Africa to Nigeria.
I'm well aware of that my friend, 70% of the people live on less than $2.00 a day and while the country made 30billion dollars in oil exports much of that has not made it's way to the average Angolan.
Angola ranks 142nd among 163 countries in Transparency International's annual corruption perception index, I read that in a article not too long ago.
Still Angola has come a long ways from it's pre-2002 standards IMO.
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