Ghana Losing Millions

Ghana is incurring huge losses in freight charges following the suspension of all flights in and out of the UK because of the volcanic eruption in Iceland.

Mr Alex Yeboah, an airside operations manager of Aviance, Ghana Limited told the Times in an interview yesterday that Ghana lost more than 10 million dollars daily in freight charges on single outbound flights carrying perishable goods to the UK.

Single outbound flights are flights, which carry goods to other countries without bringing in imported products.

He said Aviance handles an average of 20 flights a day carrying perishable goods like pineapples, mangoes, chilies, pawpaw and live animals to the UK and other European countries. Mr Yeboah said as a result of the flight suspension the importation of essential vaccines, and other goods needed in the country has also come to a halt. He disclosed that between January and March this year, Aviance handled a total import and export of 10,455,979kg of perishable goods.

Mr Yeboah said the only flights taking place were those going to the east, Kenya, Ethiopia and South Africa. A lot of perishable cargo bound for Europe had piled up at the cargo section of the airport, some of the exporters apparent by oblivious of the suspension of flights to the UK.

Clearing and exporting agents of the Ghanaian exporters handling the exports, declined to talk to the Times, saying they had not been authorized to do so. The Ghana Airports Company Ltd. (GACL) said it will offer its services to all airlines whose operations have been affected by the volcanic eruption in some parts of Europe.

The company said it has offered parking space on the tarmac for two aircraft belong to KLM and Afriquiah while they wait for clearance from the respective home bases to fly out.

The Director, Airport Operations of GAGL, Mr Charles Hanson Adu, told the Times that out of the five major carriers that fly from Europe directly to Accra, Lufthansa and Alitalia operated the normal flights on Thursday, Ghana International Airlines (GIA) has also stopped its operations to Europe.

He said GAGL is closely monitoring the current airspace closure over some parts of Europe to inform itself as to when the airspace would be opened to allow the affected airlines to operate their normal schedules to Accra.

Times independent observation at the departure lounge revealed that most of the passengers who were in the process of checking in got traumatized when the announcement was made that they could not embark on their respective flights. GIA has asked its passengers to call the airline to find out about the date for their trips.

Because of the volcanic eruption in Iceland, 17,000 flights were canceled across Europe on Friday with their airspace remaining close. Travelers, who were said to have been stranded, rushed to take rail and ferries to their destinations across Europe. Norway, Sweden, Finland and Denmark were among the European countries hit by the volcanic ash.

Experts have warned that, the tiny particles of rock, glass and sand contained in the ash cloud would be sufficient to jam aircraft engines. Health experts said the ash did not however pose any significant risk to public health because of its high altitude.