Re: KNP: Skukuza airport to reopen for commercial flights
Posted: Mon Jul 28, 2014 5:34 pm
Skukuza Airport open for business
28.7.2014 04.37 pm
It hardly seems credible that it now only takes 45 minutes to fly from Johannesburg to the Kruger National Park.
Yet, there it is, Skukuza Airport, reopened after many years.
For those yet to visit this corner of our fair country, Skukuza is the biggest camp site in the park, and South African National Parks also has its headquarters here.
For the moment, two flights a day are planned for the airport form Johannesburg and one from Cape Town, with airplanes able to carry up to 85 passengers on each trip.
The airport has been around since 1958. It was closed to commercial air traffic in 2001.
Airlink CEO Rodger Foster said when construction started, the airport only took five months to build.
“A year ago it was a sketch. The bid winner was announced in August and SANparks began to re-tar the runway,” said Foster.
Construction began in January and on June 2 the airport opened for flights.
Foster added that trees which were not originally planned for had been kept, and that SANparks advised on the rehabilitation of the runways surrounding bush.
SANparks board chairman Kuseni Dlamini, used the occasion to express his opinion on the recent sentencing of 77 years for poachers and that two more appeared in court on Monday: “We are not going to accept losing the fight (against paoching).”
28.7.2014 04.37 pm
It hardly seems credible that it now only takes 45 minutes to fly from Johannesburg to the Kruger National Park.
Yet, there it is, Skukuza Airport, reopened after many years.
For those yet to visit this corner of our fair country, Skukuza is the biggest camp site in the park, and South African National Parks also has its headquarters here.
For the moment, two flights a day are planned for the airport form Johannesburg and one from Cape Town, with airplanes able to carry up to 85 passengers on each trip.
The airport has been around since 1958. It was closed to commercial air traffic in 2001.
Airlink CEO Rodger Foster said when construction started, the airport only took five months to build.
“A year ago it was a sketch. The bid winner was announced in August and SANparks began to re-tar the runway,” said Foster.
Construction began in January and on June 2 the airport opened for flights.
Foster added that trees which were not originally planned for had been kept, and that SANparks advised on the rehabilitation of the runways surrounding bush.
SANparks board chairman Kuseni Dlamini, used the occasion to express his opinion on the recent sentencing of 77 years for poachers and that two more appeared in court on Monday: “We are not going to accept losing the fight (against paoching).”
Social Media Alert