Clients of the Lufthansa Cargo AG may now benefit from seven new destinations in Africa. Basis of the network expansion is the just started cooperation with the Kenyan cargo airline Astral Aviation. Lufthansa Cargo flies the consignments with MD-11 freighter aircrafts from Germany to Nairobi, where the consignments are fed into the route network of the African partner.

Astral Aviation distributes air cargo of Lufthansa Cargo from Nairobi to seven destinations in five African countries. The Tanzanian cities Dar Es Salaam (DAR), Mwanza (MWZ) and Zanzibar (ZNZ) are approached just as Bujumbura (BJM) in Burundi and Juba (JUB) in Sudan once a week. However two flights per week are scheduled to Entebbe (EBB) in Uganda and Kigali (KGL) in Rwanda.

Since 2001 Astral Aviation has been operating air cargo services on the African continent deploying freighter aircrafts of the following types: DC-9, Fokker 27, Antonov 12 and Cessna Caravan. The airline approaches 50 African destinations departing from the two hubs in Kenya – the Jomo Kenyatta International Airport in Nairobi and the Lobichoggio airport in the north of the country.

The list of customers includes international airlines (e.g. British Airways, Emirates SkyCargo, Etihad Airways, Kenya Airways, Martinair, Qatar Airways, Singapore Airlines), charter brokers like Chapman Freeborn, Air Partner, Panalpina Air & Ocean and Kahles Charters; international forwarders (DHL, Kühne + Nagel, SDV Transami, Union Logistics) and aid organisations like Unicef, U.S.A.I.D., World Vision and UNHCR.

Quelle: Österreichische Verkehrszeitung