Inside Kenya Airways’ Summer Operations

Kenya Airways recorded a net loss of $270 million last year when 32 aircraft were operated. This was even worse than the $227 loss in 2016 when it had 47 aircraft. According to ch-aviation.com, the Kenya flag carrier’s current active fleet consists of just 29 aircraft: 11 Embraer 190s, nine Boeing 787-8s, eight 737-800s, and one 737-300 (freight). (This excludes 777-300ERs used by Turkish Airlines).

Kenya Airways characterizes many state-owned airlines, whether with full or partial ownership. It is loss-making, heavily debt-ridden, has bloated costs, and has much political interference. It doesn’t know what it wants to be, has had multiple CEOs in a few years, and has barely grown – the latter probably sensible until, and if, it finally sorts itself out.

Kenya Airways

Excluding its Dash-8-Q400 unit Jambojet, Kenya Airways has 3.32 million seats for sale from its home country this northern summer (March 26th-October 28th), according to the latest OAG data. It is 20% down versus summer 2019.

Analysis of Kenya Airways’ Nairobi schedule shows that over half (58%) of its capacity is domestic, 31% is international within Africa, and 11% is intercontinental.

It is the fifth-largest airline serving sub-Saharan Africa; Emirates is more dominant to, from, and within the region. Yet when only international intra-sub-Saharan Africa is considered, Kenya Airways is number two.

43 destinations in 34 countries

Kenya Airways plans to serve 42 passenger destinations from Nairobi on a non-stop and one-stop basis this summer, down from 56 in the pre-pandemic 2019.

These are no longer served: Bangkok, Blantyre, Bamako, Brazzaville, Cotonou, Djibouti, Geneva, Luanda, Libreville, Malinidi (now served by Jambojet), Maputo, Mogadishu, Rome, and Yaounde.

Image: OAG.

Internationally, it is not surprising that South Africa is Kenya Airways’ number one country, followed by Tanzania, the UAE, Uganda, and the UK. In 2019, Zambia was also in its top five list; it has been replaced by the UK, which jumped from 13th. Now it serves London Heathrow 10 times weekly.

Johannesburg is #1 internationally

Kenya Airways’ top 10 domestic and international routes from its Nairobi hub are shown in the following table. Due to 15% more seats for sale than in summer 2019, Johannesburg has overtaken Entebbe for the second route overall and top spot internationally.

Photo: Markus Mainka | Shutterstock.

Johannesburg is one of two destinations in South Africa alongside Cape Town. It has daily flights to Cape Town, a city it serves in three ways: twice-weekly non-stop (787-8), three weekly via Victoria Falls (E190), and twice-weekly via Livingstone (E190). The two one-stops cover more than 2,500 miles (4,032 km) each way.

The table

Various changes to Kenya Airways’ top 10 route list have occurred since summer 2019. No more do Amsterdam, Harare, and Lusaka feature, replaced by Heathrow, Paris, and Kigali.

Will you be flying the airline soon? If so, let us know in the comments.