Covid-19: LAM chartered repatriation flight leaves Lisbon, Portugal

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Covid-19: LAM chartered repatriation flight leaves Lisbon, Portugal

2:16 CAT | 28 Jul 2020

File photo: Rádio Moçambique

Mozambique Airlines, in partnership with the Puma and Petromoc petrol stations, yesterday announced a special-price repatriation flight for Mozambican citizens stranded in Lisbon by Covid-19, the entities said yesterday.

“Tickets for this flight, under current conditions, would have cost a lot, and the people that we are trying to help would not be able to afford them,” Daniel Correia, director general of Puma in Mozambique, said.

The flight will leave Lisbon at 8:35m p.m. on Tuesday, and tickets will cost 61,000 meticais (€736 euros), against the more-than 130,000 meticais (more than €1,500) that have been charged for similar flights during the pandemic, he said.

Regular direct flights by TAP between Maputo and Lisbon were suspended in March and were not resumed or replaced, with flights only authorised on a case-by-case basis.

“The cost of the [LAM] operation is around three million meticais [€36,000], just for fuel, but there are other associated costs,” Correia explained.

The flight, chartered by LAM, will be operated by HiFly, with a capacity of 275 passengers. The same plane will also take passengers from Maputo to Lisbon on Wednesday (July 29).

To purchase a ticket, customers must be nationals of either the destination country or a bordering country. Passengers coming to Mozambique can also be holders of a residence permit, or have special authorisation to travel, according to travel agency COTUR.

Although it involves costs for passengers, the flight is described as ‘humanitarian’ by the organisers. “Without the help of these companies [Puma and Petromoc], tickets would have been too expensive for many of those flying,” Correia said.

Source: Lusa / Kioskque da Aviação / COTUR