The ATCL 787-800 has already completed its first pre-delivery flight and rumour has it that it may be delivered next weekend.
I must say it’s a bit of an odd strategy bringing that in before the 2 CS300s but, hey, this is Africa where grandstanding, politics and prestige take priority over economics. I think they’d have done much better economically to have followed the RwandAir model. Talk is that the initial schedule is for 3 flights a week to Mumbai. That’s not going to start to cover operating costs! On a positive note, it seems likely they will pass their IOSA audit, which will help other inter-continental routes (if they don’t run out of state money first).
This may may look good on paper, but I see bad things happening in Tanzania now. Fastjet may have lousy management, but I don’t like the dirty tricks rumoured to being used by TCAA under political pressure to stop their route development in Tanzania. Magafuli seems to be taking the country back to the bad early nationalistic days of Nyerere (which he himself admitted in his latter years were a mistake). Outwardly, it’s good that he talks the talk about his anti-corruption stance, but the reality is that with tougher penalties, which are not being enforced, corruption is just as rife, but bribes are much more expensive now. It’s also obvious that press freedom is being curtailed and the internet monitored more which is why many of my Tanzanian friends feel frightened to post anything critical of their government on any Internet forums.
The result of all this this is that internal air travel in Tanzania is ridiculously expensive in a country where distances are long and road transport is very dangerous. The Dreamliner is glamorous - but at what cost? Magafuli is taking the country backwards and driving away much-needed foreign investment. Many of my friends have effectively closed down their businesses in Tanzania, many moving to Kenya and Rwanda