B747-437B wrote:

rukundo wrote:

It seems that US Airlines are not really interested to serve alliance hubs in Africa.

Quite simply they have entered into anti-trust immunized agreements with other alliance carriers that basically carves up African traffic via the European hubs on a revenue sharing basis not dissimilar to colonial times.

Intersting facts.

rukundo wrote:

flyfresno wrote:

rukundo wrote:

Is there any chance of seeing a US carrier serve Cairo again (possibly United, with EgyptAir a member of Star)?

Good question, i remmember that DL served Cairo in the past. But it seems that UA has not plan to serve some Star Alliance hub in Africa. Before the SAA suspension they didn't serve JNB. And they don't serve ADD and CAI. I guess they prefer to use FRA, BRU in UE and IAD & EWR in USA to provide connecting to and from Africa.

American Airlines planned to serve Casablanca from PHL before covid when RAM has joined Oneworld. Late 2000s, Delta planned to serve Nairobi. It's Kenya Airways that operates flights from Nairobi to USA.

It seems that US Airlines are not really interested to serve alliance hubs in Africa.

I think people can overstate the impact of alliance hubs. It is rather dependent on the bilateral relationships between airlines. While these are certainly more likely between alliance partners, it is not a sufficient or necessary condition. As B747-437B correctly states, joint ventures really rule the day for larger carriers like UA and DL in terms of partnerships. UA for their part are certainly less friendly to/with Star Alliance members outside of their joint ventures. For example, they had a notoriously frosty relationship with SQ until they decided to move down the path of a joint venture. Their relationship with ET and SA was always cordial and while they provided code share capacity domestically in the US, UA never went to great length to feed traffic the other way.

UA were probably looking towards South Africa well before SAA's collapse (they began flights to CPT in late 2019) although potential Star Alliance relationships were likely meaningless since their South African is hardly reliant on connections over JNB or CPT.

B747-437B wrote:

berari wrote:

Emirates can't be the only one to be impacted ... what others are taking action, and what do you foresee here?

Also, do these rules apply to Nigerian carriers such as Air Peace?

Everyone is similarly impacted right now. Most of the airlines are either reducing frequencies significantly or else restricting sales in Nigeria to higher RBDs only.

The Nigerian carriers are the worst affected. Air Peace for example has nearly half of its fleet grounded again due to the inability to access forex for maintenance and spare parts. One of the brand new E195-E2s has also supposedly been "scrapped" for parts to keep some of the others flying.

How are Delta and United doing? United were quick to bale out of Nigeria in 2016 when there was a similar situation.

usflyer msp wrote:

B747-437B wrote:

rukundo wrote:

Emirates to suspend Nigeria flights from September over trapped funds

Dubai's Emirates will suspend flights to Nigeria from next month over an inability to repatriate funds from Africa's most populous nation, the airline said on Thursday.

This is a more complicated situation than usual in Nigeria. You could previously mitigate forex crunches there (which are extremely regular occurrances) by spending in Naira -- you could pay your airport taxes, government taxes, fuel bill, ground handling, catering, etc.. in Naira so you would at least spend a chunk of your local earnings that way.

However today the requirement is that foreign airlines have to pay EVERYTHING in hard currency - so you have to collect fares and taxes from passengers in Naira at an unrealistic "official" rate, but then you have to pay bills and remit those taxes to the government in USD at much higher market rates. This is simply unsustainable.

Basically its not even that you cant get your money out, but you also have to keep pouring in good money after bad just to keep operating.

Add to this the fact that the current aviation minister seems to have a longstanding grudge against Emirates (no idea why), and I can understand why they have decided to temporarily pull the plug on Nigeria until after the presidential elections scheduled for next February. Depending who comes to power (they almost certainly will not retain Sirika in the Aviation Ministry regardless), there will be a clean slate to at least resume discussions in good faith again - something that is simply impossible in the silly season just 6 months out from the polls.

Thanks for the update. This situation sounds really bad and
like could possibly lead to the suspension of a few other carriers. Government interference seems to constantly hurt Nigerian aviation.

It looks like the government is finally doing something about the situation.

https://www.thisdaylive.com/index.php/2 ... ped-funds/

British Airways is threatening to leave Nigeria due trapped funds. BA serves Lagos (B777-200ER / 300ER) and Abuja (B777-200ER) both daily.

Trapped funds: British airways closes inventory in Nigeria


The British flag carrier, British Airways has given the federal government an ultimatum within when to pay its trapped funds or watch it pull out from Nigeria by December.

According to information gathered, on Friday, the British airline also closed its inventory this morning to ameliorate further accumulation of trapped funds in Nigeria and to henceforth commence issuance of tickets only in dollars.

The airline gave the directive during a business meeting held with the national executive council of the National Association of Travel Agencies (NANTA) where it declared its commitment to servicing the needs of travel agencies in Nigeria.
https://tribuneonlineng.com/trapped-fun ... n-nigeria/

Note that Nigeria is not the only country in Africa to deal with this pb:

Algeria, Angola, Benin, Burundi, Central African Republic, Eritrea, Ethiopia, Equatorial Guinea, Malawi, Mozambique, Nigeria, Sudan, Gabon, Cameroon, Chad, Congo and Zimbabwe, putting further pressure on airlines as they struggle for survival.https://guardian.ng/business-services/a ... -hit-601m/

Kenya Airways missing $28m in forex payments Kenya’s national airline has told the BBC the amount of money it is trying to repatriate from Ethiopia, Malawi and Nigeria is $28m (£24m).: https://www.myjoyonline.com/kenya-airwa ... -payments/

top countries in Africa with blocked funds as of May 2022 also include Zimbabwe with $100m blocked funds, Algeria with $96m blocked funds, as well as Eritrea which has blocked $79m, and Ethiopia trapping $75m of airlines’ funds.https://aviationbusinessjournal.aero/al ... ease-funds

Delta is suspending its JFK-LOS service from 04-Oct-2022 due to low demand.

https://www.vanguardngr.com/2022/08/why ... -airlines/

mapletux wrote:

It looks like the government is finally doing something about the situation.

https://www.thisdaylive.com/index.php/2 ... ped-funds/

Looks like Emirates is happy enough with the intervention by the Nigerian government to reinstate their flights.

https://www.vanguardngr.com/2022/08/fli ... n-nigeria/

mapletux wrote:

Delta is suspending its JFK-LOS service from 04-Oct-2022 due to low demand.

https://www.vanguardngr.com/2022/08/why ... -airlines/

Delta has always said that their two routes to Lagos might as well be to different destinations.

JFK-LOS is dominated by VFR traffic with a split US-NG point of sale.
ATL-LOS is overwhelmingly US point of sale corporate traffic.

Pretty easy to judge which market they are banking on to carry them through this road bump.

mapletux wrote:

How are Delta and United doing? United were quick to bale out of Nigeria in 2016 when there was a similar situation.

Not entirely sure, but it will very much depend on the point-of-sale. If they tell enough of their tickets in the US they can certainly whether the storm. Also, while they may cut-back on flights, they might also chose to run at a loss for a while to maintain corporate contracts or brand equity. Delta have spent a lot of effort building their African business over the last two decades. I don't see them bailing - certainly cutting back on capacity - but not exiting. United have less to loose.

evanb wrote:

United have less to loose.

Honestly, based on my chats with the United network planning team, they are committed to Africa for the long term. Or as long as PQ is running things on that front at least.

mapletux wrote:

Looks like Emirates is happy enough with the intervention by the Nigerian government to reinstate their flights.

Just a fraction of their operations though. They will fly only 4x weekly to Lagos, versus 11x Lagos and 5x Abuja before the suspension.

B747-437B wrote:

mapletux wrote:

Looks like Emirates is happy enough with the intervention by the Nigerian government to reinstate their flights.

Just a fraction of their operations though. They will fly only 4x weekly to Lagos, versus 11x Lagos and 5x Abuja before the suspension.

These are now published on GDS system too. Oh well...at least their LOS bound crew can get a proper 48 hour rest in between flights

I recall at Arik, the US-NG point of sale on the JFK route was 55:45 in favor of U.S.

So now a p2p market segment with 110,000 annual pax (pre-Covid) i.e. JFK-LOS-JFK has no nonstop link effective Oct 2022. I guess ET will be overjoyed gladly taking pax via LFW + UA loads on their IAD-LOS v.v. service too should get a size able boost.

B747-437B wrote:

evanb wrote:

United have less to loose.

Honestly, based on my chats with the United network planning team, they are committed to Africa for the long term. Or as long as PQ is running things on that front at least.

Absolutely, I think UA's commitment to their African business is more significant now compared to when they exited Nigeria in 2016. That said, it's still a small business with just LOS, CPT and JNB. While their recent growth in South Africa in remarkable, only one destination/country outside of South Africa is very narrow.

Delta's African business is now rather mature since they decided to "go for it" in 2008. They are proud of what they have achieved since no other American carrier thought it was worth it and had the wherewithal to build an African business. While it's only ACC (daily), CPT, DSS, JNB (daily) and LOS (> daily) at present, I suspect that they will return to other destinations in time. ROB and ABV have been served in the past and LAD, NBO and SSG were planned but never got off the round. While they were lukewarm to partnering with KQ in the past they seem to be warming up to it a little more now which gives them a little more of a focal point. The reason why I mention this is that US legacy carriers have tended to prefer building networks that are linked to strong partnerships, including JVs. They tend to be far more conservative in foreign markets when they don't have strong partnerships.

evanb wrote:

B747-437B wrote:

evanb wrote:

United have less to loose.

Honestly, based on my chats with the United network planning team, they are committed to Africa for the long term. Or as long as PQ is running things on that front at least.

Absolutely, I think UA's commitment to their African business is more significant now compared to when they exited Nigeria in 2016. That said, it's still a small business with just LOS, CPT and JNB. While their recent growth in South Africa in remarkable, only one destination/country outside of South Africa is very narrow.

Delta's African business is now rather mature since they decided to "go for it" in 2008. They are proud of what they have achieved since no other American carrier thought it was worth it and had the wherewithal to build an African business. While it's only ACC (daily), CPT, DSS, JNB (daily) and LOS (> daily) at present, I suspect that they will return to other destinations in time. ROB and ABV have been served in the past and LAD, NBO and SSG were planned but never got off the round. While they were lukewarm to partnering with KQ in the past they seem to be warming up to it a little more now which gives them a little more of a focal point. The reason why I mention this is that US legacy carriers have tended to prefer building networks that are linked to strong partnerships, including JVs. They tend to be far more conservative in foreign markets when they don't have strong partnerships.

Don’t forget ACC for UA

evanb wrote:

I think UA's commitment to their African business is more significant now compared to when they exited Nigeria in 2016. That said, it's still a small business with just LOS, CPT and JNB. While their recent growth in South Africa in remarkable, only one destination/country outside of South Africa is very narrow.

They also fly to Ghana and there are plans for at least a fifth African route next summer (route TBD).

There is a major organizational problem that is completely hampering the development of the company. She owes money to several creditors (Air France, Bpi France, etc.) and was not far to see its planes seized. The arrival of the A220s is delayed due to poor organization regarding crew training.

We recall the old team, former CEO of Airbus Africa and a Jerome Maillet. The Marketing Director is also back. They had been removed from the management of the company 2 years ago

Some routes will be closed and fleet reduced


Air Senegal: behind the scenes of the rescue operation managed by Macky Sall

Virtually bankrupt, the company must now fight for its survival. Its new managing director can count on the return of the team of Philippe Bohn, one of his predecessors, still a director. JA takes stock of the situation of the Senegalese flag.

In the short term, Air Senegal would have found itself in default if the Head of State had not intervened. The information was given to general amazement at the end of August to the airline's board of directors. Frenchman Jérôme Maillet, who has just rejoined the company as Chief Strategy Officer after leaving at the end of 2020, did the accounts. The deficit reached, according to the testimony of a participant, 60 million euros.

The company owes several million to Air France, but also to the rental company Carlyle Aviation, the Santander bank and the French public investment bank (Bpifrance). It would have risked, if the dialogue had not resumed recently with its creditors, to see its planes grounded. Alerted for months on the worrying situation of the company, Macky Sall has decided.

Poor organisation

In July, the Senegalese president fired the then chief executive, Ibrahima Kane, with immediate effect. Former director of Fonsis, the Senegalese sovereign fund, this polytechnician was held responsible for the deterioration of the health of the company. “Neither the Covid-19 nor the current economic crisis can justify its current state”, estimates a good connoisseur of the file. The former manager had continued to develop a number of lines, many of which did not meet with the expected success.

Dakar-Douala achieves 93% negative margin. The extension of the Dakar-New York line to Baltimore is also a failure, Air Senegal failing to fill this last section. A flight where passengers are forced to get off the plane upon arrival on American soil and collect their luggage so that their passports are checked – as required by local regulations – before boarding the same plane again. device.

At the same time, the company has fallen behind in obtaining IOSA certification (IATA Operational Safety Audit, an operational safety verification system), which is essential for entering into code-sharing agreements, as well as in training crews, which disrupts the operation of its Airbus A220. This poor organization was also fatal to Cheikh Seck, the former chief operating officer, also dismissed in recent weeks.

New team under pressure

In an attempt to restore the financial balance of the Senegalese flag, Macky Sall notably turned to Philippe Bohn who, after leaving the operational management of the company in 2018, became one of its administrators. According to our information, he should see his functions expanded so that he can intervene again in the management of Air Senegal.

The former director of Airbus Africa has already participated in redrawing the organization chart. In addition to Jérôme Maillet, whom he had poached to launch the company, he also campaigned for the return of Éric Iba Gueye, whom the former CEO had pushed to leave at the end of 2020. In charge of commercial and marketing, his mission is to assist the new boss, Alioune Badara Fall, pilot of the Senegalese flag until his appointment and former adviser to the Minister of Transport, chosen by the Head of State.

This new team will work under pressure. Its main mission will be to close the most loss-making lines - which should logically lead to a reduction in the Air Senegal fleet - and to open up the company's capital to a strategic partner. This last project is not new, but it now conditions the future of the company, whose bankruptcy would not be without consequences on the financial balance of Blaise-Diagne International Airport (AIBD). The Senegalese flag represented around a third of the flights there last year.

https://www.jeuneafrique.com/1374684/ec ... aZ4CSk8q0w

B747-437B wrote:

rukundo wrote:

It seems that US Airlines are not really interested to serve alliance hubs in Africa.

Quite simply they have entered into anti-trust immunized agreements with other alliance carriers that basically carves up African traffic via the European hubs on a revenue sharing basis not dissimilar to colonial times.

Shots fired! The joint venture between United, Air Canada and Lufthansa basically does this.

ASKY has loaded service to TMS (São Tomé) effective 15OCT from Lomé via Libreville. I think this will be there 24th or 25th destination from Lomé, according to wikipedia, but ASKY started flights to RAI (Praia) maybe last month and that isn't showing on wikipedia.

AF022 wrote:

ASKY has loaded service to TMS (São Tomé) effective 15OCT from Lomé via Libreville. I think this will be there 24th or 25th destination from Lomé, according to wikipedia, but ASKY started flights to RAI (Praia) maybe last month and that isn't showing on wikipedia.

ASKY has been flying to Praia since June 2022 - 3 weekly Lomè-Dakar-Praia.

behramjee wrote:

Asky returns to JNB from 01May on a daily basis

3 weekly LFW FIH BZV JNB
2 weekly LFW LOS LBV JNB
2 weekly LFW LOS DLA JNB

Don’t expect it to get many USA Pax feeding ET.

They’ve made a few changes to the JNB operations for a few months (Brazzaville/Douala-Johannesburg cut)

3 weekly Lome-Kinshasa-Johannesburg
2 weekly Lome-Lagos-Johannesburg
2 weekly Lome-Libreville-Johannesburg

Strange that ASKY would decide to compete on non-stop LOS-JNB, while Air Peace gives lots of excuses for suspending the route...?

Does FIH-JNB then have 3 airlines now competing (SAA, ASKY and Air Cote d'Ivoire)...I presume Air Cote d'Ivoire has 5th freedom rights on FIH-JNB sector as well?

Despite a nearly 50% devaluation of the local currency and a 30% inflation rate, the number of passengers who flew domestically in Ghana during the first half of 2022 grew by 31.7% relative to 2021. Based on current trends, Ghana is on track to exceed 800,000 domestic passengers for the first time ever, and potentially hit 2.5 million overall passengers for only the second time in history after the record 3m+ transported in 2019.

https://www.graphic.com.gh/business/bus ... by-31.html

Ethiopian Airlines has been named as the technical partner to Nigeria Air.

https://www.thisdaylive.com/index.php/2 ... geria-air/

I wonder how this will play out with respect to the other Nigerian carriers who have been complaining about ET's footprint in Nigeria.

grjplanes wrote:

Strange that ASKY would decide to compete on non-stop LOS-JNB, while Air Peace gives lots of excuses for suspending the route...?

Does FIH-JNB then have 3 airlines now competing (SAA, ASKY and Air Cote d'Ivoire)...I presume Air Cote d'Ivoire has 5th freedom rights on FIH-JNB sector as well?

Yes HF has 5th freedom, although they changed their schedule recently to JNB with 2 flights at one time and 2 flights at another.

The Government of Ghana has allegedly selected "Ashanti Airlines" as its "strategic partner" to launch a new national carrier. They were selected ahead of Ethiopian Airlines, Egyptair, Africa World Airlines and others who had expressed interest in partnering. Ashanti Airlines is a startup owned by a notable local businessman that has been attempting to secure an AOC in vain for approximately 5 years and presently has no aircraft or operations.

https://www.ghanaweb.com/GhanaHomePage/ ... er-1628012

I'm hoping to fly ASKY in February JNB-Freetown (via about a dozen stops). Does anyone have anything to say about the airline?

PM wrote:

I'm hoping to fly ASKY in February JNB-Freetown (via about a dozen stops). Does anyone have anything to say about the airline?

I did Accra-Lome-Lagos-Libreville-Johannesburg on ASKY just for the experience when they first opened up the route in 2019. I left at 11am and arrived at 2am the next morning. It was such an experience that I abandoned my return leg and flew back on SAA instead. It was very cheap though and everything was on time.

B747-437B wrote:

PM wrote:

I'm hoping to fly ASKY in February JNB-Freetown (via about a dozen stops). Does anyone have anything to say about the airline?

I did Accra-Lome-Lagos-Libreville-Johannesburg on ASKY just for the experience when they first opened up the route in 2019. I left at 11am and arrived at 2am the next morning. It was such an experience that I abandoned my return leg and flew back on SAA instead. It was very cheap though and everything was on time.

It's almost nostalgic for a 1970s era multi-stop flight. Almost since I don't see that nostalgia as being positive rather than traumatic

That said, to the OP's question, ASKY are a very reliable and respected airline in the region, a de facto operational subsidiary of Ethiopian Airlines.

B747-437B wrote:

PM wrote:

I'm hoping to fly ASKY in February JNB-Freetown (via about a dozen stops). Does anyone have anything to say about the airline?

I did Accra-Lome-Lagos-Libreville-Johannesburg on ASKY just for the experience when they first opened up the route in 2019. I left at 11am and arrived at 2am the next morning. It was such an experience that I abandoned my return leg and flew back on SAA instead. It was very cheap though and everything was on time.

Oops!

evanb wrote:

B747-437B wrote:

PM wrote:

I'm hoping to fly ASKY in February JNB-Freetown (via about a dozen stops). Does anyone have anything to say about the airline?

I did Accra-Lome-Lagos-Libreville-Johannesburg on ASKY just for the experience when they first opened up the route in 2019. I left at 11am and arrived at 2am the next morning. It was such an experience that I abandoned my return leg and flew back on SAA instead. It was very cheap though and everything was on time.

It's almost nostalgic for a 1970s era multi-stop flight. Almost since I don't see that nostalgia as being positive rather than traumatic

That said, to the OP's question, ASKY are a very reliable and respected airline in the region, a de facto operational subsidiary of Ethiopian Airlines.

Thanks. I will try them.

Nigeria Air is apparently looking for crew to start up with B737-800 aircraft.

https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1573385708756238336

B747-437B wrote:

The Government of Ghana has allegedly selected "Ashanti Airlines" as its "strategic partner" to launch a new national carrier. They were selected ahead of Ethiopian Airlines, Egyptair, Africa World Airlines and others who had expressed interest in partnering. Ashanti Airlines is a startup owned by a notable local businessman that has been attempting to secure an AOC in vain for approximately 5 years and presently has no aircraft or operations.

https://www.ghanaweb.com/GhanaHomePage/ ... er-1628012

Your observations are on point! Just hope that Africa World Airlines can get picked by KQ-SA to start their own hub out of Accra.
Africa always has so much potential, but time and time again, we fail to live up to it. The leadership can be disappointing, but they are drawn from among us. Introspection necessary for each and every Ghanaian citizen at this point. What makes us fail when it is so critical that we succeed?

Africa World Airlines celebrates 10 years of operations. Promises to expand service to more African countries. Seeks to growth with Embraer E-190.

https://www.myjoyonline.com/africa-world-airlines-celebrates-10th-anniversary-promises-to-expand-to-rest-of-africa/

Sean M. - I think this is your baby that you helped grow from birth. Kudos!

ghdc10 wrote:

Africa World Airlines celebrates 10 years of operations. Promises to expand service to more African countries. Seeks to growth with Embraer E-190.

https://www.myjoyonline.com/africa-world-airlines-celebrates-10th-anniversary-promises-to-expand-to-rest-of-africa/

Sean M. - I think this is your baby that you helped grow from birth. Kudos!

Didn't AW just suspend flights to ROB and FNA (I might be mistaken). Why did they exit if they are planning to re-enter?

I am going to Senegal soon and want to tack on The Gambia. Is Air Senegal the only game in town for flights between Dakar and Banjul? The flight times don't necessarily suit my schedule.

Any tips on visitng the area? Things to do, see or neighborhoods to stay?

ghdc10 wrote:

Sean M. - I think this is your baby that you helped grow from birth. Kudos!

Haha, I was there at conception - so long before the actual birth.

If you have an hour or so to spare, have a look or listen at my long chat with Jon Howell of AviaDev Africa about the story behind the startup of Africa World Airlines from 2010-12. The chat includes a shallow dive into key principles and things for aviation entrepreneurs in Africa to keep in mind for their own projects. If you watch on YouTube, it also features a slide show of interesting historical photos (I used to have so much hair!!!) from the airline startup period to commemorate the 10th anniversary of AWA's launch.

YouTube : https://youtu.be/ZrNTG9EwSeM
Podcast : https://aviadevinsight.libsyn.com/223-s ... cess-story

AF022 wrote:

Didn't AW just suspend flights to ROB and FNA (I might be mistaken). Why did they exit if they are planning to re-enter?

That's something Joe the new CEO needs to answer. For now, what he has said publicly is that he intends to refocus capacity away from lower margin and higher competition international routes in favour of additional capacity on domestic routes where market share has been eroded by Passion Air's growth.

B747-437B wrote:

ghdc10 wrote:

Sean M. - I think this is your baby that you helped grow from birth. Kudos!

Haha, I was there at conception - so long before the actual birth.

If you have an hour or so to spare, have a look or listen at my long chat with Jon Howell of AviaDev Africa about the story behind the startup of Africa World Airlines from 2010-12. The chat includes a shallow dive into key principles and things for aviation entrepreneurs in Africa to keep in mind for their own projects. If you watch on YouTube, it also features a slide show of interesting historical photos (I used to have so much hair!!!) from the airline startup period to commemorate the 10th anniversary of AWA's launch.

YouTube : https://youtu.be/ZrNTG9EwSeM
Podcast : https://aviadevinsight.libsyn.com/223-s ... cess-story

Thank you for the interesting insights. I am planning on launching my own line of paraben-free organic Lion spray for Chinese arrivals in Africa.
Would be nice to see an A220 in AW livery! KQ-SA need to really pay attention to this interview.

ghdc10 wrote:

Would be nice to see an A220 in AW livery!

Unlikely to happen simply because the ownership cost of the A220 is so much higher than second-hand E190s, especially given the utilisation constraints in West Africa. Besides, AWA is cautious about dealing with Boeing and Airbus for now because of the Chinese shareholding, just in case something flares up with China sanctions similar to the Russia situation - Embraer is far more pragmatic in that respect.

AF022 wrote:

ghdc10 wrote:

Africa World Airlines celebrates 10 years of operations. Promises to expand service to more African countries. Seeks to growth with Embraer E-190.

https://www.myjoyonline.com/africa-world-airlines-celebrates-10th-anniversary-promises-to-expand-to-rest-of-africa/

Sean M. - I think this is your baby that you helped grow from birth. Kudos!

Didn't AW just suspend flights to ROB and FNA (I might be mistaken). Why did they exit if they are planning to re-enter?

Aircraft type was likely the major constraint on the ROB and FNA routes. The E-145s just can't carry alot of luggage. Especially compared to Asky or Kenya Airways that use a 737 on those routes and offer more baggage allowance.
I'll guess with the E-190s in the plan they will return once they have better equipment.

louA340 wrote:

Aircraft type was likely the major constraint on the ROB and FNA routes. The E-145s just can't carry alot of luggage. Especially compared to Asky or Kenya Airways that use a 737 on those routes and offer more baggage allowance. I'll guess with the E-190s in the plan they will return once they have better equipment.

That's a common misconception. The E145 has marginally more volumetric luggage space per passenger (0.184m3) than the E190 does (0.182m3) and exactly the same as the 737-700 (0.184m3). It is only the 737-800 that has a slightly superior volume per passenger (0.23m3).

The average checked bag size on AWA was approx. 0.108m3 and 16.7kg, and the average number of checked bags per passenger were 1.45 to ROB and 1.38 to FNA. That means that there was pretty much never any volumetric issues with luggage.

The only luggage issues on that route were when we had 20-30 passengers connecting out of SAA's Washington flight during summer and Christmas vacations - they regularly came with 2*23kg and sometimes excess baggage beyond that. As a result, there were sometimes payload restrictions due to weight on the longer ACC-FNA legs. But this happened maybe 8-10 days per year - the other 98% of the time was fine. And of course, that is a non-issue nowadays with SAA out of that market.

The loss of feed to/from SAA was a big hit to AWA's volumes on the FNA/ROB route. We took the route up to daily in 2019 in conjunction with SAA's decision to move their entire IAD operation to ACC instead of a split ACC/DSS operation. Similarly with the ABJ route - we launched it in Feb 2020 with the intention of replacing SAA on that route when they pulled out in March 2020, but then COVID hit and SAA didn't return to Accra for nearly 2 years and we had to re-evaluate that too.

B747-437B wrote:

louA340 wrote:

Aircraft type was likely the major constraint on the ROB and FNA routes. The E-145s just can't carry alot of luggage. Especially compared to Asky or Kenya Airways that use a 737 on those routes and offer more baggage allowance. I'll guess with the E-190s in the plan they will return once they have better equipment.

That's a common misconception. The E145 has marginally more volumetric luggage space per passenger (0.184m3) than the E190 does (0.182m3) and exactly the same as the 737-700 (0.184m3). It is only the 737-800 that has a slightly superior volume per passenger (0.23m3).

The average checked bag size on AWA was approx. 0.108m3 and 16.7kg, and the average number of checked bags per passenger were 1.45 to ROB and 1.38 to FNA. That means that there was pretty much never any volumetric issues with luggage.

The only luggage issues on that route were when we had 20-30 passengers connecting out of SAA's Washington flight during summer and Christmas vacations - they regularly came with 2*23kg and sometimes excess baggage beyond that. As a result, there were sometimes payload restrictions due to weight on the longer ACC-FNA legs. But this happened maybe 8-10 days per year - the other 98% of the time was fine. And of course, that is a non-issue nowadays with SAA out of that market.

The loss of feed to/from SAA was a big hit to AWA's volumes on the FNA/ROB route. We took the route up to daily in 2019 in conjunction with SAA's decision to move their entire IAD operation to ACC instead of a split ACC/DSS operation. Similarly with the ABJ route - we launched it in Feb 2020 with the intention of replacing SAA on that route when they pulled out in March 2020, but then COVID hit and SAA didn't return to Accra for nearly 2 years and we had to re-evaluate that too.

Thats an interesting fact I didnt know about the volumetric space. I was not thinking volume wise but rather on weight and payload capabilities. As competitors can offer 2x23kg baggage allowance and not have issues on the routes. Having spoken to some friends and from my own experience, I've at times had to fly with other carriers due to the baggage allowance.

louA340 wrote:

Thats an interesting fact I didnt know about the volumetric space. I was not thinking volume wise but rather on weight and payload capabilities. As competitors can offer 2x23kg baggage allowance and not have issues on the routes. Having spoken to some friends and from my own experience, I've at times had to fly with other carriers due to the baggage allowance.

AWA has never tried to compete on baggage allowance and quite honestly doesn't need to given the target clientele. AWA consistently has at least 20-30% less checked baggage per passenger on head-to-head basis. For example, on Lagos - Accra, AWA continues to average around 0.89 checked bags per passenger while others have averaged 1.5 to 2.3 bags per passenger, and AWA yields tend to be 30% higher than the closest competitor on that route too. The vast majority of local traffic in the region today travels with hand luggage only or at most a single small checked bag. Domestically, the situation is even starker - I have seen flights go out full with 50 passengers between Accra and Takoradi for example sometimes with less than 10 total checked bags. Overall average domestic baggage is less than 0.6 per passenger and in fact, over 50% of local passengers do not check a bag anymore. The large baggage allowances and excess baggage tend to be used more by tourists and diasporans visiting the region.

The Nigerian Minister for Aviation has explained how Ethiopian Air became the technical partner for Nigeria Air and laid out the the roadmap for the future.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=abq4p2SAWco

B747-437B wrote:

louA340 wrote:

Thats an interesting fact I didnt know about the volumetric space. I was not thinking volume wise but rather on weight and payload capabilities. As competitors can offer 2x23kg baggage allowance and not have issues on the routes. Having spoken to some friends and from my own experience, I've at times had to fly with other carriers due to the baggage allowance.

AWA has never tried to compete on baggage allowance and quite honestly doesn't need to given the target clientele. AWA consistently has at least 20-30% less checked baggage per passenger on head-to-head basis. For example, on Lagos - Accra, AWA continues to average around 0.89 checked bags per passenger while others have averaged 1.5 to 2.3 bags per passenger, and AWA yields tend to be 30% higher than the closest competitor on that route too. The vast majority of local traffic in the region today travels with hand luggage only or at most a single small checked bag. Domestically, the situation is even starker - I have seen flights go out full with 50 passengers between Accra and Takoradi for example sometimes with less than 10 total checked bags. Overall average domestic baggage is less than 0.6 per passenger and in fact, over 50% of local passengers do not check a bag anymore. The large baggage allowances and excess baggage tend to be used more by tourists and diasporans visiting the region.

Oh, I see. Thats some good insight into the numbers.

atal17 wrote:

AF022 wrote:

ASKY has loaded service to TMS (São Tomé) effective 15OCT from Lomé via Libreville. I think this will be there 24th or 25th destination from Lomé, according to wikipedia, but ASKY started flights to RAI (Praia) maybe last month and that isn't showing on wikipedia.

ASKY has been flying to Praia since June 2022 - 3 weekly Lomè-Dakar-Praia.

behramjee wrote:

Asky returns to JNB from 01May on a daily basis

3 weekly LFW FIH BZV JNB
2 weekly LFW LOS LBV JNB
2 weekly LFW LOS DLA JNB

Don’t expect it to get many USA Pax feeding ET.

They’ve made a few changes to the JNB operations for a few months (Brazzaville/Douala-Johannesburg cut)

3 weekly Lome-Kinshasa-Johannesburg
2 weekly Lome-Lagos-Johannesburg
2 weekly Lome-Libreville-Johannesburg

Initial JNB operations for ASKY (a few years ago) saw an Ethiopian Airlines aircraft that would otherwise overnight at JNB operate the route. I believe ASKY also sent its own aircraft nonstop at some point. I am surprised to see that even with the consolidation of USA-bound flights by ET at Lomé (EWR/JFK/IAD) that Asky/Ethiopian are not considering a nonstop out of JNB. There's an Ethiopian Boeing 787-8 that overnights at JNB that could work with an early morning departure out of JNB to connect with the LFW bank, and return from same bank in time for departure to Addis Ababa at JNB.

B747-437B wrote:

The Government of Ghana has allegedly selected "Ashanti Airlines" as its "strategic partner" to launch a new national carrier. They were selected ahead of Ethiopian Airlines, Egyptair, Africa World Airlines and others who had expressed interest in partnering. Ashanti Airlines is a startup owned by a notable local businessman that has been attempting to secure an AOC in vain for approximately 5 years and presently has no aircraft or operations.

https://www.ghanaweb.com/GhanaHomePage/ ... er-1628012

What are your thoughts on this?

B747-437B wrote:

PM wrote:

I'm hoping to fly ASKY in February JNB-Freetown (via about a dozen stops). Does anyone have anything to say about the airline?

I did Accra-Lome-Lagos-Libreville-Johannesburg on ASKY just for the experience when they first opened up the route in 2019. I left at 11am and arrived at 2am the next morning. It was such an experience that I abandoned my return leg and flew back on SAA instead. It was very cheap though and everything was on time.

I laughed at a dozen stops. That's a commitment, only something an a.netter or a very cost conscious person would do. I would love to hear about where most people get on/off and all that.

B747-437B wrote:

ghdc10 wrote:

Sean M. - I think this is your baby that you helped grow from birth. Kudos!

Haha, I was there at conception - so long before the actual birth.

One day I will ask the same about GIA.

B747-437B wrote:

ghdc10 wrote:

Would be nice to see an A220 in AW livery!

Unlikely to happen simply because the ownership cost of the A220 is so much higher than second-hand E190s, especially given the utilization constraints in West Africa. Besides, AWA is cautious about dealing with Boeing and Airbus for now because of the Chinese shareholding, just in case something flares up with China sanctions similar to the Russia situation - Embraer is far more pragmatic in that respect.

I recall reading a while back that the costs of operating regional jets without solid feeds from a larger airline can be exorbitant. I recall Independence Air in the USA that attempted to go at it solo with E145s and/or CRJs (hate CRJs!) Is the E190 a game changer on this front?

AF022 wrote:

ASKY has loaded service to TMS (São Tomé) effective 15OCT from Lomé via Libreville. I think this will be there 24th or 25th destination from Lomé, according to wikipedia, but ASKY started flights to RAI (Praia) maybe last month and that isn't showing on wikipedia.

Here's to hoping you have added it to Wikipedia yourself!

berari wrote:

Initial JNB operations for ASKY (a few years ago) saw an Ethiopian Airlines aircraft that would otherwise overnight at JNB operate the route. I believe ASKY also sent its own aircraft nonstop at some point. I am surprised to see that even with the consolidation of USA-bound flights by ET at Lomé (EWR/JFK/IAD) that Asky/Ethiopian are not considering a nonstop out of JNB. There's an Ethiopian Boeing 787-8 that overnights at JNB that could work with an early morning departure out of JNB to connect with the LFW bank, and return from same bank in time for departure to Addis Ababa at JNB.

Those flights (which operated very briefly if at all) weren't actually coded for ASKY - they were ET coded as a 5th freedom ADD-JNB-LFW operation on the spare 737-800 that was parked all day at Johannesburg.

That availability is going to change from next month (W22) as ET brings back the third daily JNB flight to connect into the resurrected afternoon bank at Addis. So rather than ET859/858 arriving 0355 and departing 2330, you will have arrivals into JNB at 0355/1305/1955 and departures at 0820/1425/2330 for much improved aircraft utility.

ASKY never actually operated its own aircraft nonstop I believe - that was supposed to start on 15MAR20 or thereabouts as a second daily flight to supplement the milk run - the logic back then being the milk run would focus on traffic out of Lagos, Libreville and Douala while the nonstop would be a collector for the wider region.

berari wrote:

B747-437B wrote:

The Government of Ghana has allegedly selected "Ashanti Airlines" as its "strategic partner" to launch a new national carrier. They were selected ahead of Ethiopian Airlines, Egyptair, Africa World Airlines and others who had expressed interest in partnering. Ashanti Airlines is a startup owned by a notable local businessman that has been attempting to secure an AOC in vain for approximately 5 years and presently has no aircraft or operations.

https://www.ghanaweb.com/GhanaHomePage/ ... er-1628012

What are your thoughts on this?

For the benefit of those who don't click on the link, my thoughts are reproduced below.

"Unfortunately, everything we have seen about Ashanti Airlines seems to imply yet another government contract handed to a political crony rather than a selection on merit. It is unfathomable for a serious strategic partner to have zero experience in the industry they are seeking to enter, and the lack of progress they have made with GCAA even trying to acquire their licenses is another red flag. I hope to be proved wrong but I do not expect this to be successful. Government of Ghana is making the same mistakes they made with Ghana International Airlines and Ghana Airways. They have not learned their lessons."

berari wrote:

I laughed at a dozen stops. That's a commitment, only something an a.netter or a very cost conscious person would do. I would love to hear about where most people get on/off and all that.

It was fascinating actually because each sector was so completely different, both from a passenger and a service perspective.

Accra-Lome - 11am departure - mainly passengers out of Banjul and Monrovia continuing through - barely 20 local passengers joined at Accra and total load was around 80 pax. Service was crew walking through the cabin with a 2L bottle of room temperature water and some plastic cups - you had to flag them down if you wanted some.

Lome-Lagos - 130pm departure - absolutely packed with no empty seats. Almost everyone was a connection out of Newark headed to Lagos. Service was a lukewarm cup of water again, but this time pre-poured and offered from a tray.

Lagos-Libreville - 3pm departure - pretty empty again. Around 65 passengers, with 20-30 destined for Libreville and the rest to Johannesburg. Less than a dozen of us remained on board from Lome. Service was a full lunch catered out of Lome (chicken and rice - no choice).

Libreville-Johannesburg - 630pm departure - totally full. Most passengers joined in Libreville headed to Johannesburg. DCS was down in Libreville so much confusion and delay ensued since they declared free seating. I sat next to a South African guy who worked in mining and was flying NDJ-ABV-LFW-LOS-LBV-JNB-PLZ to get home. Service was a full drink service with a nice pack of ASKY branded chocolate coated nuts, followed by a full dinner catered out of Libreville (chicken and potato - choice of that or beef with rice). Flight was nearly 5.5 hours because ASKY does not overfly Angola for some reason (they still don't), so we had to literally detour around the entire country and flew over Congo, DRC, Zambia, Zimbabwe and Botswana before landing into Johannesburg around 230am.

When I booked the ticket, I actually messaged the ASKY Country Manager in Ghana to let him know I was going to try out the milk run. He was horrified - his exact response was "But WHY? This flight isn't meant for people like you!!!"

berari wrote:

I recall reading a while back that the costs of operating regional jets without solid feeds from a larger airline can be exorbitant. I recall Independence Air in the USA that attempted to go at it solo with E145s and/or CRJs (hate CRJs!) Is the E190 a game changer on this front?

Unit costs in isolation are irrelevant. They become relevant only relative to your unit revenues, your competitors unit costs and the market size. The experiments in the USA with RJs head-to-head with larger gauge aircraft failed because of the competitor response, not because of the RJs.

The beauty of the E145 for AWA was that it allowed us to extract a yield premium through frequency. Pre-launch, our customer surveys did not indicate this was something we could achieve as West African consumers didn't (and in fact, still don't realise, or at least won't admit in surveys that they do!) value schedule convenience relative to price. We realized this on the Lagos route where AWA consistently was able to extract an average fare nearly double that of one Nigerian competitor and more than 50% higher than the other Nigerian competitor. When we looked at the data, we found that the highest yields actually came from passengers doing same day return flights - something only possible with our schedule. So we doubled down on frequency and maxed out the Ghana side bilateral allocations going up to as many as 6x daily flights (during Christmas 2019 we even flew 9 daily flights on some peak days). Kumasi was a similar situation, where our 10x daily E145 schedule easily trumped anything a competitor with larger aircraft could put into the market - our load factors outstripped the competitor airlines by at least 10%. With good historical and forecast data, we developed a proprietary yield management model that was able to achieve our objective of "being the highest fare AND the lowest fare in the market". In fact, the model was so successful that the primary competitors on domestic and Nigeria routes both attempted to copy it by pivoting to 50-seaters themselves.

Today, the story is quite different. The domestic market in particular has grown so quickly (close to 120% growth since 2018 - despite the pandemic!!!!) that you can actually maintain a similar high frequency model on some routes with a larger gauge aircraft. The plan for 2020 was actually to partner with COMAC who would have sent us a pair of ARJ21s as part of their testing program (they pay for the aircraft and crew, we pay for the operating costs) to evaluate both how the aircraft would perform in Africa at minimal risk to us, as well as to evaluate the economics of a larger gauge on our yield management. However, COVID put paid to that idea and the market has grown so quickly since then that there isn't the luxury of that kind of experimentation anymore. The revenue environment is actually being artificially inflated by lack of capacity. I said back in March that "there is approximately 30-40 per cent of demand that is being spilled at the current price points, and likely as much as 150-200 per cent unmet demand at a lower price point" (see https://www.businessghana.com/site/news ... in-8-years ) and despite the general economic downturn since, that probably holds true today as well. Which makes it critical to find a way to compete at lower unit costs on your own terms before a competitor forces you to compete at lower unit revenues - hence the need to upgauge sooner rather than later.

https://www.reuters.com/article/senegal ... NL8N31B3ZY

Senegal Airlines to pull out of Dakar-Cotonou-Douala-Libreville routing.
They must be having a lot of problems.