Air France launches direct flights to Dar es Salaam

Air France launches direct flights to Dar es Salaam

Air France has launched direct flights from Paris to Dar es Salaam, making it the 31st route in Sub-Saharan Africa after a 28-year absence.

Dar es Salaam becomes the second destination in Tanzania, joining Zanzibar where the airline has been operating since October 2021 with two weekly flights into the Abeid Amani Karume International Airport.

The airline will operate three weekly flights to Dar es Salaam using 279-seat 787-9s, its second-smallest wide-body after the A330-200.

In January, the Airline had threatened to cancel the Dar es Salaam route and withdraw from the market following a decision by Zanzibar’s Airports Authority (ZAA) ordering airlines that intend to use Terminal 3 building to sign with Dubai National Air Travel Agency (Dnata), the authority’s preferred ground handler.

It took a diplomatic intervention for Royal Dutch Airlines (KLM) and Air France to continue its operations at the newly built Terminal 3.

By adding Dar, it now means that Nairobi which Air France started in March 2018, will be de-tagged and fully nonstop in both directions.

Currently, four flights are nonstop to Nairobi and three are via Zanzibar.

Read: Indian airline adds Kenya route in global expansionNot surprisingly, booking data shows that the Paris-Dar roundtrip point-to-point market between January and September 2022