Private airline steps in to carry Air Tanzania Company Limited passengers

Kigoma airport workers look at an ATCL aircraft 5H-MWG on April 9th

The Air Tanzania Company Limited (ATCL) management has entered into an agreement with Precision Air to carry its already booked passengers for a week while finalizing the maintenance of another plane expected to start operations next month. 


This follows the crash of its plane while taking off at the lake side town of Kigoma on April 9th in which all the 35 passengers and crew aboard cheated death.

Speaking in an interview with The Guardian yesterday in Dar es Salaam ATCL’s Acting Managing Director Paul Chizi said they were depressed over the recent incident as they were gearing up to improve the company’s situation.

Chizi noted that they had agreed with Precision Air to carry its already booked passengers for a week.

“We decided to find other options that would see that our customers are never stranded because of lacking our services…we are collaborating with Precision Air to see that they transport our customers for one week, ” explained Chizi.

He said all the 35 passengers and crew aboard the ill-fated plane were transported back to Dar es Salaam and it would see to it that all its passengers who had previously booked with ATCL were transported as arranged.

“We had a meeting on Monday to see how we would resume services. The decision we reached is to find other options to ensure our customers who had earlier booked flights with us do not get stranded, hence we agreed with Precision Air to do so until all the passengers have been transported,” he said.

On Monday, 35 passengers and crew aboard an Air Tanzania Company Limited (ATC) flight ‘Ft 119’ from Kigoma to Dar es Salaam cheated death after the plane crashed on take-off at the lake-side town.

By David Kisanga, The Guardian 

Source: http://in2eastafrica.net