TAAG Angola puts inflight Wi-Fi and mobile phone services

TAAG Angola Airlines has become OnAir’s first Sub-Saharan African customer – line fitting its new B777-300ER fleet with Internet OnAir and Mobile OnAir. The airline will use Thales’ TopConnect to access OnAir’s inflight Wi-Fi and mobile phone services on its new fleet, to be delivered from May 2014. OnAir offers a consistent, reliable service across Africa and all the routes the airline flies, thanks to the widest-reaching network of regulatory approvals and the largest and most geographically diverse number of roaming agreements of any provider. With authorizations from over 100 countries and more than 375 roaming agreements, OnAir provides consistent coverage on all the major routes across the world. In addition, OnAir uses Inmarsat’s SwiftBroadBand satellite network, the only network to provide worldwide coverage.

 

“TAAG is an ambitious airline, leading the modernization of air transport in Angola,” said Captain Lourenço Manuel Gomes Neto, Executive Vice President Operations of TAAG Angola Airlines. “OnAir connectivity, in the form of inflight Wi-Fi and GSM, gives our passengers the freedom to stay in touch with the world outside the aircraft, strongly enhancing their experience. The worldwide service reliability is particularly important, given the routes we fly across from and across Africa.” Passengers flying on TAAG Angola’s B777-300ER will experience the full benefits of OnAir connectivity. The inflight Wi-Fi solution, Internet OnAir, enables passengers to email, update their social media, and browse news sites. Like a Wi-Fi hotspot on the ground, passengers only need to log on and their enter credit card details before they are free to surf the Internet.

 

Passengers can also use OnAir’s inflight GSM product, Mobile OnAir, to email, text, talk, and use their mobile apps as they please. Charges are included in the user’s monthly phone bill, exactly like using international roaming. “This new deal with TAAG Angola Airlines shows that cabin connectivity is now a truly global market,” said Ian Dawkins, CEO of OnAir. “We are in the strongest position to make inflight connectivity a truly worldwide phenomenon, given the breadth and depth of our regulatory and roaming agreement networks. On top of SwiftBroadband’s consistency across the world, this means we can offer an un-compromised service to all airlines, wherever they might be.”

 

Source: OnAir

PICS: RwandAir's brand new Bombardier Q400 NextGen Arriving in Kigali

Rwanda enjoyed another proud moment yesterday when national airline RwandAir flew in their latest acquisition, a Bombardier Q400 NextGen. The new plane will soon begin commercial service, making regular appearances in Kamembe, RwandAir’s only domestic destination as well as regional destinations such as Entebbe and Bujumbura. RwandAir now operates 7 new aircraft, 2 B737-800NG, 2 B737-700NG, two Bombardier CRJ900 NextGen and now the Q400 NextGen, which makes it the operator of one of the youngest fleets in Africa. According to the CEO John Mirenge, after the launch of Douala which begins on the 30th of March, they will also add Abidjan in 2014 then look at new destinations such as Luanda, Harare and Lusaka for 2015.  

TAAG Angola Increases South Africa Routes from May 2014

 

TAAG Angola from May 2014 is increasing capacity to South Africa, with additional weekly service to Johannesburg, as well as switching to larger aircraft on selected Cape Town service.

 

Luanda – Cape Town eff 07MAY14 1 of 3 weekly service operates with 777-200ER, instead of 737-700

• DT579 LAD0650 – 1205CPT 73G 15
• DT579 LAD0650 – 1205CPT 772 3
• DT580 CPT1305 – 1625LAD 73G 15
• DT580 CPT1305 – 1625LAD 772 3

Luanda – Johannesburg eff 08MAY14 5th weekly service being added, on board 777-200ER

•  DT577 LAD0810 – 1230JNB 772 x46
• DT578 JNB1410 – 1630LAD 772 x46

Source: airlineroute.net

Linhas Aereas de Mocambique (LAM) plane wreck found in Namibia, all 33 onboard dead

Windhoek — Police on Saturday found the burned wreckage of a Mozambican Airlines plane the day after it went missing in northeastern Namibia, saying none of the 33 people aboard had survived. The crash in the remote, swampy terrain of Namibia's Bwabwata National Park killed victims from several countries, including a baby, and is one of the worst accidents on record in Mozambique's civil aviation history.

 

"My team on the ground have found the wreckage. No survivors. The plane is totally burned," Willie Bampton, a regional police coordinator in Namibia's Kavango region, told AFP. The Mozambican government confirmed the crash and said it would declare a period of national mourning for the victims -- six crew members and 27 passengers, of whom 10 were Mozambican, nine Angolan, five Portuguese, one Portuguese-Brazilian, one French and one Chinese. The plane, en route from Mozambique to Angola, went down in the deserted terrain of the Bwabwata park, where Namibia turns into a narrow strip of land sandwiched between Botswana and Angola. Mozambican authorities confirmed it was a Brazil-manufactured Embraer 190 aircraft and said it was the newest plane in the airline's fleet. Embraer issued a statement confirming the crash and extending "its support to investigating authorities".

 

Embraer and the airline have both sent teams to the scene. The investigation is being led by Namibia with help from civil aviation authorities from Mozambique, Angola, Brazil and the United States.

The airline, known in Portuguese as Linhas Aereas de Mocambique (LAM), said the plane was purchased brand new in late 2012 and had completed 2,905 flight hours when it crashed. The airline's chief executive, Marlene Manave, told a press conference the pilots were "experienced". "We do not have any information on the circumstances of the accident and we cannot speculate on possible causes as the investigators must be given the time and space to do their work," Manave said, adding that the airline did not yet have any information on the plane's black box. She also said the victims included a Mozambican baby under two.

 

The company said it was providing counselling and legal advice to families in both Mozambique and Angola and had set up a hotline for those who needed information. The European Union banned LAM and all air carriers certified in Mozambique from flying in its airspace in 2011, citing "significant safety deficiencies". But the concern was about Mozambique's civil aviation authority, rather than the track record of the various airlines. The MT 470 flight took off from Maputo at 0926 GMT Friday for the nearly four-hour journey to the Angolan capital Luanda. With about 100 seats, it was two-thirds empty. Last contact with air traffic controllers was made at 1130 GMT over north Namibia during heavy rainfall.

 

The search for the plane was hampered both by the rough terrain and torrential rains pounding the area, the Namibian regional police coordinator told AFP. "There are no proper roads, you have to go through the bush slowly and it's making our job difficult," he said. Deadliest since 1986 presidential jet crash.The Bwabwata National Park, a 6,100-square-kilometre (2,355-square-mile) reserve, is a sparsely populated area covered by wetlands and dense forests. Villagers who had heard explosions helped point police in the right direction. Before the wreckage was found, relatives and friends of those on board gathered at Maputo airport, many frustrated at what they said was the lack of information. "They told us it was a forced landing. I know it's a crash," said Luis Paolo, a friend of a Portuguese businessmen on the flight.

 

Portuguese President Anibal Cavaco Silva published a condolence message to victims' families. The accident is the deadliest for Mozambique since a plane carrying then-president Samora Machel crashed in 1986 in South Africa en route home from an African leaders' summit. That crash, which claimed at least 34 lives, remains a mystery, but speculation has lingered that it was linked to tensions with the then-apartheid regime in South Africa. Mozambique said it would set up a commission of enquiry to work with Namibian authorities on Friday's crash and expected to make its preliminary results public within 30 days.

Report By Shinovene Immanuel and Jinty Jackson (AFP)

TAAG Angola to Increase Harare flights

According to reports by Agencia AngolaPress, Angolan Airline (TAAG) will increase its current Harare frequency to 4 weekly. A new Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) was signed this week between the Civil Aviation Authorities of both Zimbabwe and Angola. The new bilateral agreement allows TAAG to increase flight frequencies on the Luanda-Harare-Lusaka route to 4 per week with the possibility of fifth freedom rights. Currently no official schedule is available yet for the increase.

Source: Agencia AngolaPress