Flydubai's debut flight touches down at Kilimanjaro airport

December 20, 2017: Dubai-based flydubai's inaugural flight touched down today at Kilimanjaro International Airport (JRO), increasing capacity to Tanzania and further expanding its network across twelve destinations in Africa.

According to reports, flydubai would offer six flights every week to Kilimanjaro, three of which will be via one stop in the capital, Dar es Salaam. However, it will soon increase the total number of flights to Tanzania to 14 flights every week.

As part of the inaugural programme, flydubai showcased its new Boeing 737 MAX 8 aircraft, which was unveiled for the first time at the Dubai Airshow in November 2017.

The service to Kilimanjaro sees the total number of flydubai's destinations in Tanzania increase to three, along with Dar es Salaam and Zanzibar.

The carrier began operations to Tanzania in 2014 and has become increasingly popular among travellers from Dubai and the GCC as a tourist destination, and is seeing a steady growth in passenger numbers.

Kilimanjaro International Airport is located between the regions of Kilimanjaro and Arusha in Northern Tanzania. The airport is the major gateway to the Kilimanjaro region, a main international tourism destination that includes Mount Kilimanjaro, Arusha National Park, Ngorongoro Crater and Serengeti National Park.

Only a few international carriers operate to Kilimanjaro and flydubai will be the first airline to provide direct air links from the UAE.

Ghaith Al Ghaith, Chief Executive Officer of flydubai said: "With our service to Kilimanjaro, we are responding to a growing demand for travel between the UAE and Tanzania. flydubai is the first UAE airline to offer direct air links to Kilimanjaro with the aim to connect this market to Dubai and beyond, and offer travellers more choice and flexibility. Passengers will have the opportunity to connect from Dubai onwards to more than 250 destinations."

Makame MB, Minister for Works, Transport and Communication said: "I am glad to welcome flydubai to our %u2018Gateway to Africa's Wildlife Heritage'. On behalf of the government and the KADCO management, we would like to thank flydubai for working tirelessly together to make this new service possible and no doubt this route will be a success."

Sudhir Sreedharan, senior vice president commercial (GCC, Subcontinent and Africa) at flydubai said: "We are delighted to see our service to Kilimanjaro take off today, as it marks our twelfth destination in our network in Africa and the third point in Tanzania. Our service to Kilimanjaro follows an increase in passenger demand and reflects flydubai's commitment to open up underserved markets. We look forward to offering six weekly flights on this route and to connecting travellers from across flydubai's network with the Kilimanjaro region and vice versa."

According to sources, Emirates is expected to codeshare on this route, and as part of the Emirates flydubai partnership, passengers will have greater choice for onward travel from Dubai to hundreds of destinations across the world.