East African Airways - History

History

The East African Airways Corporation (EAA) was set up on 1 January 1946 by four East African governments, namely Kenya, Tanganyika, Uganda and Zanzibar, all of which were under the rule of the British Empire at the time the airline was created.

In early 1957, services to the United Kingdom were launched on a once-weekly basis, at first operated by BOAC on EAA's behalf, and then in EAA's own right with ex-BOAC Argonauts. This tourist-class service had low load factors when it was started, as it competed with same-fare BOAC Britannias and Viscounts. Also in early 1957, the Nairobi–Aden route was started; in mid-September the same year the route was extended farther east, from Aden to Bombay via Karachi, and Argonauts were also deployed on it.

Following the opening of Embakasi Airport on 9 March 1958, EAA started transferring all their operations from Wilson Aerodrome to the new airport; upon moving their DC-3 operations in July the same year, all scheduled services operated from Embakasi, becoming their hub since.

In 1960, two Comets ordered by the corporation in 1958 were put into service on the London–Rome–Khartoum–Entebbe–Nairobi, London–Rome–Khartoum–Nairobi–Dar-es-Salaam, and Nairobi–Aden–Karachi–Bombay routes. The same year, EAA reactivated Seychelles-Kilimanjaro Air Transport, a 1952-founded airline otherwise known as SKAT that had previously ceased operations, as a wholly owned subsidiary that flew some routes for EAA. SKAT was later re-christened Simbair Ltd when it was decided that EAA would no longer operate charter services; the renaming effectively took place in May 1971 (1971-05) and became an EAA's wholly owned subsidiary that took over SKAT and EAA passenger and cargo charter operations.

As in the early 1960s the airline was running short of capacity and the fleet was growing old, three Fokker F27s were ordered as a replacement for the DC-3s and the Argonauts. The airline had not yet taken delivery of the third of these aircraft, when in late 1962 a fourth was ordered. In May 1965 (1965-05), an order for three VC-10s worth GB£11 million was placed. Likewise, another VC-10 was ordered in 1969.

Management assistance from Aer Lingus was contracted in mid-1976 amid deteriorating relations between the three countries that ran the airline. Financial difficulties deepened when both Tanzania and Uganda struggled to pay their outstanding debts for the operations of the airline, or directly missed them. EAA operations came to a total halt in January 1977 (1977-01). The airline had incurred in a debt of US$120,000,000 ($460,230,643 in 2013) when it went into liquidation in February 1977 (1977-02), with the Kenyan government being one of the major creditors.

Both Kenya and Uganda had established their own national airlines before the folding of the corporation: Kenya Airways and Uganda Airlines were formed in 1977 and 1976, respectively. Tanzania followed in April 1977 (1977-04), forming Air Tanzania.