Continuing from the previous post, the latter portion of Air Zaïre's 1977 timetable showing services from Kinshasa shows DC-10 services to several cities in Europe, again including not only likely candidates such as Paris, but also unusual stops such as Sunday flight to Rome and stop in Madrid on the way to CDG.
Kinshasa seemed to be a budding hub in those days, making use of its natural geographic location at the center of the continent. Service to African capitals radiated in eastward and westward directions, to francophone capitals like Lomé and Libreville, but also major anglophone cities like Lagos and Nairobi, mostly using the Boeing 737s.
A host of domestic destinations included major cities like Mbuji-Mayi, Lubumbashi, and Kisangani. A number of smaller Zaïrian cities were connected to the capital and these secondary cities with the turboprop Fokker F-27 Friendship.
As mentioned previously, air service is essential to a sparsely-populated territory the size of Western Europe, with even today only a few thousand miles or paved roads. Compared to the 2009 Hewa Bora map, however, Air Zaïre of more than 30 years previous served a great many more destinations.
The above is part of the collection of Björn Larsson, and is reposted under the generous privileges of the fantastic Timetable Images website.
