St Helena Airport

At present you can not fly to St Helena, however you will be able to very soon.

The St Helena Airport is expected to be opened in early 2016, around May 2016. Recently announced that Comair will be offering weekly flights to St. Helena, every Saturday, on a Boeing 737-800 aircraft in British Airways livery. The flights will offer both business class and economy seating on the five-hour flight. The aircraft will be capable of carrying up to 120 passengers and a limited amount of cargo. Increased frequency “will be considered if there is sufficient demand”.

According to the announcement there will be an “early morning” departure from Johannesburg to St. Helena, a one hour turnaround time in St. Helena and an arrival into Johannesburg in the “early evening”. This means that passengers from connecting flights (e.g. to and from the UK) will almost certainly have to spend a night in Johannesburg on both the outbound and return trips. “Bookings will open for sale towards the end of 2015. A ticket can be purchased by a variety of means, including ba.com, Comair’s call centre and international and online travel agencies. Arrangements will also be put in place for purchase on St. Helena. Further details on purchase options will be available later this year.” Prices have not been announced.

Also announced recently that Comair would also operate flights to and from Ascension Island, initially on a four-weekly basis but subject to review.

St Helena will have an open skies policy; this allows any airline operator who meets all the required standards to fly in and out of St Helena. Therefore, at the end of October 2015 Atlantic Star announced a direct flight from the UK to St Helena to take place at Easter 2016, from and to London Gatwick. Price: £1,299 return (Economy). There was a delay in the St Helena Airport which might affect this, to stay updated visit www.atlanticstarairlines.com.

THE FIRST PLANE

The first plane in history to land on St. Helena was a Beechcraft King Air 200, registration ZS-TAE, captained by Grant Brighton. It was booked to perform ‘calibration flights’, as part of the airport set-up process.It arrived at 13:50h on Tuesday 15^th September 2015, and was greeted by large crowds, keen to mark this historic occasion.

See it here: