On August 30, Kenya Air Traffic Controllers’ Association president Peter Ang’Prawa warned that flight in and out of Addis Ababa were not safe. He said that were deeply concerned with a number of serious safety issues they had noted in the past few days after their Ethiopian counterparts went on strike.
“Letters of agreement between Addis Ababa and Nairobi on coordination procedures are not being followed. Flights inbound to Nairobi from Addis Ababa are calling Nairobi Control without prior estimates, with the possibility of creating serious air-misses with known traffic at the transfer point,” he said.
This statement did not augur well with The Ethiopian Airlines Group, the largest aviation group in Africa and number 24 in the world, forcing the authorities to air out the matter in a detailed press statement.
The Ethiopian Civil Aviation Authority fully and categorically rejects the false and baseless
statements circulated by the Kenyan Air Traffic Controllers Association in their circular of 30
August 2018 regarding the safety of Ethiopian airspace following the illegal strike of Air Traffic Controllers (ATCs) in Ethiopia. The Ethiopian Civil Aviation Authority would like to assure the wider public as well as airlines, national civil aviation authorities and international and regional bodies that following the illegal strike by ATCs in Ethiopia, the Area Control Center (ACC) in Addis Ababa is being manned by adequate number of well trained, highly capable instructors and professionals who are current for the positions with the necessary ratings and validation.
The wider public, national civil aviation authorities, international and regional bodies and airlines should not be misled by the false statements of the Kenya Air Traffic Controllers Association, whose aim is to lend support to an illegal strike in Ethiopia. It is completely unacceptable and constitutes a clear lack of basic ethics and professionalism for the Kenyan Air Traffic Controllers. They have acted in an irresponsible way and has caused damage to the reputation of the Ethiopian Civil Authority. If the Kenyan Civil Aviation Authority does not take the necessary action on the Association per its own national laws, the Ethiopian Civil Aviation Authority will take the issue to the concerned international body.
The Ethiopian Airlines Group would like to reassure its customers and the general travelling public that the Ethiopian Airspace remains very safe and highly secured even after the illegal strike of the Ethiopian Civil Aviation Air Traffic Controllers ATC. Since August 21, when the illegal strike started, Ethiopian Airlines has been working in close coordination with the Ethiopian Civil Aviation Authority and the volunteer air traffic controllers, ATC instructors and ATC controllers that it brought from other sister African countries. It is successfully supporting the Ethiopian Civil Aviation Authority to enable the latter to efficiently and safely manage the Ethiopian airspace in line with global standards.
As a result, all Ethiopian Airlines scheduled and unscheduled flights and other airlines operating to/from Ethiopia have been operating smoothly with high standards of flight punctuality and safety. We would like to inform all our customers that we did not have any flight delay or cancellation caused by ATC. In fact, we are happy to announce that taxi-in, taxi-out and flight arrivals efficiency has improved significantly in the week under ATC strike. We take this opportunity to thank the Ethiopian Civil Aviation Authority management, the volunteer ATC experts and all other stakeholders for the successful coordination, which enabled our country to continue business as usual in our airspace management.
