ABOUT KIA
The focus of many visitors to East Africa is to see the spectacular wildlife and beautiful scenery of northern Tanzania. Kilimanjaro International Airport serves as the gateway for visitors interested in African safari and scenery, and thus it is uniquely located at the heart of the major tourism attractions of East Africa – indeed at the foot of the highest mountain in Africa and at the thresholds of the great national parks of northern Tanzania and southern Kenya.
The airport is strategically located about halfway between the tourist towns of Arusha and Moshi, and is connected to these towns by good tarmac roads. From the airport, it takes about half an hour to reach any of the towns by car. Arusha is on the slopes of Mount Meru and quite near to Arusha National Park and is the main base for safaris to the newly declared natural wonders of Africa, Serengeti National Park and Ngorongoro Crater. Moshi is at the base of Mount Kilimanjaro and so it is the main centre for climbing expeditions to the “Roof of Africa.”
Kilimanjaro International Airport was built in 1971, to mark the tenth anniversary of Tanzania’s national independence. Ever since, it has required much effort to upgrade the airport into a world-class point of entry to the region and this is something of a symbol of Tanzania’s prime outlook on tourism.
To make the airport more efficient and modern, the airport is operated by Kilimanjaro Airports Development Company (Kadco), a development company owned by the government of Tanzania. With a vision to develop the airport into a regional and international hub, Kadco has spent in the past 15 years a significant amount of its revenues to increase the airport’s operation performance which included resurfacing the runway, installation of automatic terminal information system, positioning automatic weather stations, improving cargo handling facilities and upgrading the fire rescue services and security systems to International Civil Aviation Organisation standards. At the moment, Kadco has embarked on a new terminal renovation and expansion project. Through the project, the airport will further be upgraded and expanded, where a new taxiway will be built to increase the capacity of the airport, and the terminal building will be enlarged to accommodate the growing flows of visitors into northern Tanzania. The airport is Tanzania’s second busiest: it handled nearly one million travellers in 2012, and this number has been growing steadily in the past five years.
Kilimanjaro International Airport has direct flight connections to Europe, the Middle East and several destinations on the African Continent. Some of the international airlines using the airport are KLM, Edelweiss Air, Condor Air, Turkish Airline, Qatar, Ethiopian, Kenya Airways, Rwandair, Fastjet and Precision Air. All in all, Kilimanjaro International is growing in terms of traffic, airline operators and other activities.
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