Pretoria – This year, South African Airways (SAA) celebrates 50 years of direct flights to Mauritius.
“The airline presently operates daily flights on the route with a recent 9% increase in frequency, resulting in twice daily operations on Thursdays with double flights too on Saturdays and Sundays.
“The route was one of SAA’s first African destinations and has shown sustained growth over the past 50 years,” said the airline.
SAA first introduced flights between Johannesburg and the Indian Ocean Island in 1957 as a refuelling stop on route to Perth with direct end-point flights commencing eight years later.
“Mauritius has remained an important destination for SAA throughout its history. Recent frequency additions on several key African routes, including Mauritius, hold strategic commercial value for the business and forms part of the impetus of the Long-Term Turnaround Strategy (LTTS).
“Mauritius remains one of the fastest growing economies on the continent with consistent demand-side growth in both business and leisure travel,” said SAA acting CEO Nico Bezuidenhout.
Load factors on the route continue to perform positively with growing trade and economic development driving business travel outside of traditional seasonal leisure trips. Mauritius has enjoyed consistent real GDP growth at an aggregate of 5.9% since 1995.
The Mauritius route is served by Airbus A320, the latest arrival in the SAA fleet. - SAnews.gov.za
