Kenya Airways (KQ) passengers scheduled to travel to Nairobi from Dubai International Airport were on Sunday morning left stranded for more than six hours after the carrier cancelled two of its flights to Kenya’s capital on safety concerns.
The airline’s management, however, only confirmed the cancelation of one flight, insisting that it was necessary for the safety of crew and customers.
The airline flies to Dubai from Nairobi’s Jomo Kenyatta International Airport two times daily. It also flies to Dubai from Mombasa three times per week.
“It’s true that KQ307 had to be cancelled. This is because the aircraft computer system that monitors traffic during flight failed just before departure out of Dubai,” said the airline in a response to media queries on Monday.
The airline remained tight-lipped as to how the affected passenger’s, majority of whom took to social media to express their dissatisfaction with the service offered by the airline, were flown back to Nairobi.
The cancelation of the Dubai-Nairobi flights means that KQ passengers who were traveling to other East African nations via Nairobi had to face an extended travel period, as they had to spend more hours in Dubai.
The airline, which relies on the Dubai route to connect its passengers flying to Europe and Asia, said it was working with the aircraft component manufacturer Boeing to get a replacement of the faulty plane parts in the shortest time possible.
The airline, one of the biggest in Africa, has suffered lack of parts, which is affecting the global supply chain, a move that has resulted in dozens of flight cancelations and delays since early this year.
The airline had early this year flagged the risk of services being disrupted because of the unexpected impact of supply chain challenges.
“We have had one of our aircraft undergoing major checks since late last year,” KQ’s chief executive Allan Kilavuka told the FlightGlobal during an interview at the International Air Transport Association Annual General Meeting in Istanbul last month.
