Turkish Airlines (THY) commenced scheduled flights into Mombasa, serving Kenya’s coastal city now 5 times a week.
Passengers connecting from Turkish’s global network via Istanbul will now have the option to fly to THY’s second Kenyan destination, after Nairobi, every Monday, Tuesday, Thursday, Saturday, and Sunday, leaving IST (Istanbul Ataturk Airport) at 1810 hours before reaching MBA (Mombasa Airport), via JRO (Kilimanjaro International Airport), at 0355 hours the next morning.
The coast tourism fraternity enthusiastically welcomed the new flight, which was the first bit of aviation good news since both Qatar and Brussels Airlines had announced they would not after all start their planned flights to Mombasa while other charter airlines withdrew from the route due to insufficient demand.
Tour operators from across Europe offering safaris to Tanzania and beach holidays to Kenya have equally expressed their support for the new flight, one of the few international scheduled services connecting major airlines to Mombasa, Star Alliance partners Ethiopian being the other one.
Local tourism representatives were united in endorsing the sentiments of a regular contributor who said: “This is very good news ahead of the festive season. Turkish now connects Mombasa 5 times a week with all their destinations. I read you wrote they now have the largest global reach which means they can bring tourists from North America and Europe but also from Asia. Our emerging markets in Asia and Eastern Europe are doing well, and it is now up to us here in Kenya to promote ourselves. Turkish has offered concessionary travel so we can work with them to put missions together to market Kenya. We are happy that such a big airline shares our own confidence in Kenya to start up with 5 flights a week.”
Across the border in Tanzania, safari operators, too, were enthusiastic when the inaugural flight touched down at Kilimanjaro International Airport outside Arusha.
The efforts by Turkish to promote the destination has, according to information received from Arusha already, resulted in new business for the northern safari circuit, which includes such global brand names like the Serengeti, Ngorongoro, Lake Manyara, and Tarangire national parks.
Turkish Airlines has also launched itself in the Maldives bringing added advantages to this island nation so dependent on tourism. The arrival of Turkish Airlines in the Maldives is seen as a major breakthrough for Maldives and its tourism industry, and this has given them an unprecedented edge over the other competing tourism island destinations of the Indian Ocean.
0 comments:
Post a Comment