Industry News
South African Airways Operates First Flight Since Resurrection By Tom Boon
S
outh African Airways is back. The airline operated the first flight of its return on September 23rd, operating from Johannesburg to Cape Town with an Airbus A320. The airline was placed into business rescue in December 2019 and was even set to be shut down completely at the height of the world health crisis last summer. A year ago, it didn’t look very likely that South African Airways would ever return to the skies. Recently Etihad CEO Tony Douglas told Simple Flying never to say never about the Airbus A380’s return. It seems that we also should’ve never said never to SAA’s return.
Back in the blue skies This morning was one of celebration for South African Airways. Since the airline was grounded over a year ago, a flight carrying passengers took to the skies for the first time. This was flight SA317 from Johannesburg to Cape Town.
leased by SAA, who took delivery of the aircraft new.
What does the new SAA look like? So what should we expect from the rebirth of SAA? ch-aviation’s data reveals that the airline has just eight aircraft left in its fleet. This includes, 3x Airbus A319 2x Airbus A320 1x Airbus A330-300 2x Airbus A340-600 Information from aviation data experts Cirium shows that the airline has just over 200 round trips planned for each month moving forward. For the time being, the airline is focusing on intra-African flights. All flights are scheduled for the A320 family aircraft, except for Accra in Ghana, which has the sole A330 assigned. https://simpleflying.com/saa-first-flight-sinceresurrection/
Airbus A320 reporting for duty A six and a half-year-old Airbus A320 was given the honor of operating the airline’s reinaugural flight. According to chaviation.com, ZS-SZJ is 6.62, having first flown on February 10th, 2015. The jet is owned by Goshawk and is
SAA’s first passenger flight of 2021 departs Johannesburg Airport. Photo: Getty Images 9 | ABA Publications | Africa TRAVEL | Nov 2021
