Welcome on Board

FlyWestair Welcomes You on Board

Welcome on board this FlyWestair flight. This month marks our fifth month of operation since starting the scheduled service on the 12 th

of July 2019. It has been a very exciting few months and we at FlyWestair are very happy with the airline’s performance.

We have a dedicated team that has been able to maintain a 98.7% on-time dispatch reliability over the past months. What this means is that of the more than 500 flights that have been conducted to date by the airline, less than ten did not depart on time. This is a performance that we can be proud of and one that ranks us with the best airlines in the sub-region.

To give you more perspective, the best on-time performance out of Cape Town International Airport from rival South African airlines ranges between 76% to 94% with a year to date average of 86.6%. This is according to statistics held by Airports Company South Africa (www.airports.co.za/ business/statistics/on-time-performance).

“It’s about time” and we at FlyWestair are very proud and excited that we as a privately owned Namibian carrier are able to compete with established carriers from South Africa and deliver on our promise to get you to your destination on time.

During the month of November we also carried our tenthousandth passenger. For this we thank you, our clients, for your support and enthusiasm over the past months. We receive a lot of positive feedback from all our travellers, especially our Namibian clients who are naturally very excited about flying a Namibian airline that is no burden to the Namibian fiscus.

There has however been one change this month and our Cape Town clients have probably already experienced it - going through immigration in Oranjemund and not Eros Airport. Some background: Eros Airport has always been a sensitive issue for the Namibian Government. In 2002 the cabinet of Namibia decided that Eros should be closed to scheduled international traffic and that only scheduled domestic routes should be allowed to depart from here. At the time, the reason given for this restriction was that jet aircraft operating from Eros Airport posed a safety risk and that the noise pollution will cause a public outcry.

These reasons have in practice been proven to be irrelevant as Air Namibia has been operating jet aircraft out of Eros Airport on domestic schedules since 2012. It has since been widely accepted by the aviation fraternity and the flying public that the actual reason for this restriction was to protect the aforementioned airline, whom at the time in 2002, was not able to compete with an international service out of Eros.

This resolution is also the reason why FlyWestair clients are not able to clear immigration at Eros Airport. We believe that there is no reason for imposing this restriction on FlyWestair as we have an initial domestic route going to Oranjemund and that a similar practice has been conducted for many years via Walvis Bay by Air Namibia. However, we at FlyWestair do not make the rules and after various engagements with all government owned stakeholders (Namibian Airports Company, Namibian Civil Aviation Authority, the Ministry of Works and Transport and the Ministry of Home Affairs) we had to accept their insistence to clear immigration at Oranjemund. The only alternative would be a counter-productive and costly legal process.

This change has proven to be of not much inconvenience, as most of our clients enjoy stretching their legs and breathing in the fresh coastal air whilst clearing immigration at Oranjemund Airport. FlyWestair is working with the airport, immigration authorities and the Namibian Police to make this process as effortless as possible. Their cooperation is critical and thus far we can only thank them for their assistance. The second benefit of not clearing immigration at Eros Airport is that FlyWestair has been able to shorten the check in time at Eros from two hours to one hour for departing clients and arriving clients can just collect their baggage before leaving the terminal, a process that should not take longer than 10 minutes. After operating in this manner for the past three weeks we have been able to prove that this change has no effect on door to door travelling time and has been received very positively by most clients and especially the town of Oranjemund, who desperately needs this international connection for development.

Have a wonderful festive season and please do not forget to share your favourite FlyWestair moment on social media using #flywestair.

FlyWestair