New Eastern Cape freight airport mooted

The failure by the Airports Company of South Africa (Acsa) to invest in the runway at the Port Elizabeth airport has created an opportunity for the Coega Development Corporation (CDC) to build a new airport in the Coega Industrial Development Zone (IDZ). The CDC has issued a notice for an Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) study to assess the feasibility of establishing a cargo airport and an aeronautical/ aerospace industrial cluster in the Coega Industrial Development Zone (IDZ). Work on extending the Port Elizabeth runway to handle wide-bodied aircraft has been stalled for more than 15 years by Acsa, despite the fact that it has been given the land it needs by the Port Elizabeth municipality. “We are happy that the project is beginning to take shape. Feasibility work has been done by industry experts which has yielded great potential for the project. The establishment of an advanced manufacturing cluster for aeronautical and aerospace industries has always been on our vision map,” says Mogamad Sadick Davids, CDC metallurgy business development manager. Research undertaken for the CDC identified that the clear and largely empty blue skies over the Eastern Cape represented valuable real estate that had the potential to help the province’s aerospace industry to really take off. In addition, the proposed airport will be able to take wide-bodied freighters, enabling manufacturers based in the Port Elizabeth area to export and import directly by air. At present international airfreight travels mostly by road to OR Tambo. According to Davids, opportunities have been identified for the assembly and manufacture of a range of aircraft and components. There is a relatively strong aeronautical sector in the province, which is already home to at least two aircraft assemblers – the Mooney in Port Alfred and the RV series by the Aircraft Assembly and Upholstery Centre in Port Elizabeth. A third facility has been on the cards for Somerset East for some time, but has failed to raise sufficient funds for the assembly of two types of light aircraft. There are also more than nine flying schools in the province. Possible aeronautical and aerospace opportunities being investigated by the CDC include the manufacturing of helicopters, aerospace engines, auxiliary equipment and parts. The airport could also serve as a base for the assembly and testing of prototypes in the largely uncluttered Eastern Cape skies. One of the strategic advantages that the motor industry brings to the province is the support infrastructure that sustains it. It is only thanks to the motor industry that the province has the skills to service robots, to design production lines, to make or maintain tools, or to program CNC machines. Most importantly, perhaps, the province has the logistics chains in place which source components from around the world and deliver them just in time or just in sequence to the production line – and then to export the fully built up vehicles or value-added components.