Imperial Airways, 1937: The African Routes

As with its trans-Asian operations shown yesterday, the technology available to Imperial Airways in the early age of aviation necessitated a series of regular way stations for the royal charter's southerly system spanning Africa.

After the upper Nile, the line made its way to Khartoum, whence it splits, with one line turning to the west: Kano—Lagos—Accra and finally Takoradi, which only has domestic links today. There must have been pitstops in the drylands of French Central Africa but these are unnamed here; the paths of the green routes, connecting Algeria and Morocco to Niger and then the Congo, and reaching across to Madagascar, suggest French operations.

Continuing to follow the Nile south, the Cairo-to-Cape line stopped at Malakal, toady in South Sudan, then fanned across British East Africa in a complex web which appears to shown that one set of services remained inland along the Great Rift, passing through Nairobi on the way to Lusaka, Salisbury (today Harare) and Bulawayo in Rhodesia, and  then finally ending at Johannesburg. 

Another schedule reached the Swahili coast at Mombasa—Dar Es Salaam—(Ma)lindi and coastal Mozambique, with a bridge connection through Nyasaland at Blantyre, passing through Lourenço Marques (today Maputo) to terminate at Durban. The unlabeled green lines with the Union clearly suggest an early-stage South African Airways, reaching both Cape Town and Windhoek. 

South African Airways: the Southern African destinations 2013

Following from the previous post, this promotional brochure shows the ease of connecting to the southern cone of Africa from South African Airways's gateways in Europe: Munich, Frankfurt, and London Heathrow, via Johannesburg. With the map superimposed, these long-haul legs seem mercifully short. Cities in Namibia, Botswana, Zimbabwe, Lesotho, Swaziland, Mozambique and Malawi are shown, as well as the airline's many domestic destinations. In most cases, especially outside of South Africa, the proposition is to fly from Europe to OR Tambo, passing over a final destination, before tracking back to reach it on a local connection.

Air Zimbabwe Schedule from Harare, 1997

The full schedule of Air Zimbabwe services from Harare in 1997 shows 17 destinations on at least two, possibly three continents. The typical timetable handbook format, used around the world by many airlines, often presents some curious itineraries: as in this instance it is difficult to contemplate such a volume of passengers between Zimbabwe and, say, Salt Lake City, or Tampa, or Klagerfurt, or Barbados, to warrant taking up the space (and expending the printing costs).

This is particularly true as the state carrier at the time seemed to serve only Frankfurt and London Gatwick (interestingly via Larnaca) beyond Africa, aside a somewhat curious Harare-Perth-Sydney service, with a UM flight number but operated by a B747. As there is no other source which records this venture, it suggests that Air Zim was wishfully assigning a codeshare as its own metal.

A decade later, the airline's schedule would pivot away from Antipodean and Anglophone areas and orient itself along the Africa-Asia-China axis  (as seen yesterday) which has been a major story of the 21st century.

This item is borrowed from the incredible blog airline-memorabilia.blogspot.com which uncovered this 15-year old gem. The Timetablist is indebted to the Airline Memorabilia Blog for its continued support and the privilege of reposting these timetable pages. 

Air Zimbabwe Schedule, September 2011

An Air Zimbabwe timetable from last year, some 14 years after yesterday's map, shows an airline no longer limited to Southern Africa, but with less service within the region also.

Such important connections as Cape Town, Durban, and Nairobi are gone, although the service to Lusaka now connects to Lubumbashi in the DR Congo. The furtive crossing of the Indian Ocean to Mauritius has now been replaced with a quixotic Asian connection to Beijing via Kuala Lumpur. The prestigious London route has been restored.

While the aircraft livery has been updated and a global reach has been achieved, Air Zimbabwe continues to be plagued with problems, and indeed was grounded in the time between this schedule's printing and now.

Air Zimbabwe Network, 1998

An academic airline illustration, from the January 2000 issue of the Journal of Transport Geography, in a paper titled, "Air Transport Operations and Policy in Zimbabwe, 1980-1998" by Chris Mutambirwa and Brian Turton.

The map isn't a graphic feat, its dry two-toned appearance fitting for the journalism at hand. The map shows not only current routes of Air Zimbabwe in 1998, but those such as Harare-Maputo and Victoria Falls-Windhoek that were withdrawn in 1997. The connecting lines also note the number of weekly flights per route. Gaborone is strangely out of place.

Air Zimbabwe: The Worldwide Network, c.2006

Via the Travel House UK website comes this undated, computer-generated artifact. Only Africa is shown (and its unclear why the map of Zimbabwe is repeated at left), with red arrows angling out to destinations in Asia and the UK.

Of uncertain vitage, it can be at least cross-referenced with the Timetable Image's archive of the March-October 2006 AirZim schedule, which included once-weekly Dubai-Lubumbashi-Harare and Harare-Singapore-Beijing jaunts (using the same ageing B767 that also reached Gatwick). The B737 reached as far as Mauritius. All but Beijing and London are today erstwhile, as Air Zimbabwe continues to suffer, its zigzag-striped Boeings as pariah as the regime that owns it.

The latest news out this month is a bizarre report that the strike-ridden, cash-strapped, trade-embargoed airline will be acquiring new Airbus jets. This just weeks after pilots refused to operate the current, ancient fleet until they were paid back wages, and amid talk of a need for either a government bailout, privatization, or liquidation.