The biggest and the most profitable airline in Africa, Ethiopian airlines is on it again. The national carrier is flying higher both in the skies and in the land in terms of development. The current project they are planning to do is another international airport in Oromia, whose announcement was made in the year 2018.
In an interview with a news outlet, the Tewelde Gebremarian, who is the CEO, gave more details of the upcoming project. In 2018, the airline said that once complete, it will have a capacity of 100 million passengers. The go-ahead of the construction is already out, and it will be at Bishofu, a place called Absera.
More details about the airport
Other information that the CEO gave includes the project will take up to 35 square kilometers hence the African’s biggest airport.it will be bigger than UAE’s Dubai airport and the Istanbul airport. Once complete, it will be handling 100 million-plus passengers with hotels, free shopping malls training centers, and logistic centers as well. The main goal is to reduce much pressure at bole international airport.
“We have not only survived, but also we have grown. So, all the targets that we have planned for vision 2025 are completed by 2018, and we came up 8with new vision 2035, which is predominantly scaling up the growth and more fleet, passengers, destinations, and particularly a new airport.”
“Because bole airport is not going to accommodate us, we have a beautiful expansion project. The airport looks very beautiful and very large, but with the growth that ae going every year about three to four years, we are going to be full. So, we have started now anew project, Absera, in bishoftu.
Challenges that are likely to be encounter during the construction of the new airport
Being the second international airport in the Addis Ababa area, the airport is estimated to be serving 120million plus passengers annually. The operations will begin in ten years. However, there is fear that the project is likely to delay
According to the new report released by risk analysis PGI Intelligence, it warns that this mega airport project is likely to face delay because of several factors like securing the finances. It also warns that the foreign exchange shortages might worsen in years to come due to huge costs.
Ethiopian airlines scorecard
The airport will be the biggest in Africa. Its also going to be larger than London’s Heathrow. The airport has a capacity of 90 million passengers but only handled 73.4 million passengers last year. It will also beat the Africa busiest O.R Tambo international airport in South Africa.
The mega airport is the country’s most prominent project at the cost of $4.8 billion. The plan will reflect the Ethiopian economic ambitions, which will go a long way in helping the country’s tourism, light manufacturing sectors. It will also put Ethiopian airlines in an excellent position to its market and eventually becoming east Africa’s aviation hub from Nairobi.
Ethiopian Airlines remains to be the only fastest and biggest growing airline in Africa. In 2019, freight weighing 432000 tons and twelve million passengers were transported and carried respectively. This gives a gross of over 4$ billion. The airline has also expanded its routes around the globe. It can feed the hotels around Addis Ababa every day.
