Panic Affects Ghanair's US Flights

Exactly a week after the September 11, 2001 plane hijacking that devastated Washington and New York, the aviation industry is slowly, but painfully coming back into full flight.

The good news is that Ghana Airways, the national carrier has beaten the strict Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) requirement for resumption of its four-weekly flights to the United States of America.

But the resumption of flights to the United States has not come without problems. The Accra Mail has learnt that yesterday's flight, which was scheduled to depart in the morning, could not take off because only 50 passengers out of the 272 fully-booked flight checked in, probably due to panic.

As a result the flight had to be rescheduled for the evening in the hope that travelers would put the tragedy behind them and resume normal business. At press time was not known whether the flight did take off yesterday evening, but whatever the case it seems the full patronage of air travel may take longer than expected.

During the one week that the national carrier did not fly to the US, its most lucrative route, it probably lost thousands of dollars. When The Accra Mail called Mr. Sam Bannerman-Bruce, Public Relations Manager of Ghana Airways to get details of the losses incurred by the airline, he said he was in the middle of a meeting and could not divulge any information. But our own estimates show that with a fully booked flight of 272 passengers, multiplied by the four weekly flights at a minimum price of US$1000 per passenger, the distressed airline probably lost US$1,414,400 during the four days it did not fly direct to the US.

As if that was not enough, the new security measures put in place by US authorities have suspended the freighting of mail and cargo, to the US, thus denying Ghana Air another major source of revenue.

As part of the security measures, passengers would now be required to physically identify their baggage before boarding and will be allowed to carry one hand luggage not exceeding five kilograms. This is another area in which the airline was making much revenue.

These measures will certainly put a lot of pressure on the management and board of Ghana Air and compel them to brainstorm and design new methods of making revenue in the wake of a shrinking aviation business worldwide.