Kaya 959 Reporter
The SA government has stated that emergency measures have been put in place at OR Tambo International Airport in Johannesburg to ensure a consistent jet fuel supply amid fears that a crisis might derail the aviation industry’s comeback.
Due to the damage caused by the floods in KwaZulu-Natal, two foreign airlines were forced to cancel 15 flights, while others were forced to reroute and make stops for fuel elsewhere.
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Kaya Biz with Gugulethu Mfuphi spoke to Aaron Munetsi, CEO of the Airlines Association of Southern Africa, which represents all big carriers in SA and the region about the latest developments.
LISTEN TO THE FULL CONVERSATION HERE:
Munetsi says the current supply of fuel in the airline does not meet the required standard set by the airline.
“We are now averaging 3,5 days supply of stock that is available at any given time at the OR Tambo International Airport, in any normal day we would have 6 to 7 days supply, that would be the standard we would want to have.”
Because of the situation, we have right now, we are averaging 3,5 days of stock available, which mean any airline that operates at the OR Tambo International Airport will need to be able to uplift any fuel requirements for every flight they have.” said Munetsi.
At a press conference, Mpumi Mpofu, CEO of Airports Company South Africa (Acsa), stated that “While overall stock levels are stable, certain suppliers impacted by the declared force majeure are still unable to acquire the quantities of jet fuel they require,”
“They (The Central Energy Fund) are working on providing approximately 1.5 million litres of jet fuel in the event that the mismatch between supply and demand is not mitigated,” said Mpofu.
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