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Wednesday, September 25, 2013

■ ANGOLA: Menongue International Airport to come online before 2014 - Ceitas.

ENANAManuel Ceitas, the CEO of Angola's airport and air traffic authority (Empresa Nacional de Aeroportos e Navegação Aérea - ENANA), says that Comandante Kuenha International Airport, situated in the near-central Angolan town of Menongue in Cuando Cubango Province, could become operational before the end of this year given that its rehabilitation and expansion works are almost complete after nearly 6 years of work.

Old Menongue Terminal
According to Mr Ceitas, Memongue's passenger terminal has been enlarged from 1'400sqm to 5'526sqm with a capacity of handling 200 arriving & departing pax/hour. Additionally, a new VIP area, 14 shops including three restaurants, bars and banks, have been built. 
"[Prior to the works]There was no communication system or VOR/DME but that has been rectified. There was only one check-in counter, but now that has been replaced by seven, and while before we had no conveyor belt for luggage, we will now have two carousels," he noted.
Airside, runway 13/31 has now been enlarged from 3'500x45m to 3'500x60m in width with airfield and runway lights installed as well.

A new air traffic control tower has also been built.

The development follows on from recent news that both Uíge Airport, in northwestern Angola, and Namibe's Yuri Gagarin International would come online shortly as part of the country's extensive infrastructural rehabilitation programme following a two-decade long civil war that ended in 2002.