New planes benefit airline

The arrival of Air Namibia’s new fleet of aircraft has seen the national carrier improve on its On-Time Performance also known as schedule adherence, the airline announced last week.
The airline said it has recorded very good On-Time Performance (OTP) in the last nine months reaching over 93% OTP in some months.
In a statement released last week, the airline’s Chief Operation Officer, Rene Gsponer said: “Air Namibia is serious about significant improvement on its operational performance and financial sustainability. Our On-Time Performance for the past 9 months has been above our target of 90%.

This is a commendable achievement for Air Namibia and we have seen an equally positive response from the market in terms of ticket sales and positive feedback.” The airline’s management attributed the improvement in its schedule adherence to the recent recapitalisation of the airline by the government which it said has provided the airline with state-of-the- art aircraft making it one of a few airlines with the youngest operational fleet in the world resulting in much more reliable aircraft with an improved technical dispatch reliability. In addition, the airline said its improved financial stability has made normal operations possible. “We at Air Namibia are very excited and encouraged by our improved operational performance and we are grateful to our shareholder, travel trade partners and ultimately you the paying customer (passenger) for the continued support,” the airline said.
OTP is calculated by taking the percentage of flights delayed by more than 15 minutes of the total number of flights performed by an airline in a particular month. The industry standard is measured on flights that are delayed by 15 minutes or more. Departure delays shorter than 15 minutes are usually made up in flight and the aircraft still arrives at its destination on time.