Luanda - Around USD 1.4 billion is the amount needed to conclude the new Dr. António Agostinho Neto International Airport, which is being built in the municipality of Icolo and Bengo, in Luanda.
This was revealed Friday to the press by the coordinator of the airport's Operations Office, José Paulo de Nóbrega, after the experimental flight of Angolan airline TAAG landed at the new airport.
He said that, at the moment, physical and financial execution was 60 percent, with the remaining amount needed to conclude the northern runway, buildings, equipment, amongst other activities.
The airport, which is expected to cost between US$5 and US$6 billion, will handle 50,000 tons of goods per year and is sized to receive B747 and A380 aircraft, which are currently the largest commercial aircraft.
It is also planned to build from scratch an airport city, in an area of 75 square kilometres.
"We have a project from 2010, which is 12 years old, but a lot has changed. There is a very big exercise of readapting the airport to the new reality. At the time, we had an airport to support 50,000 tons of cargo, which was an ideal number for Angola. Today the country needs 500,000 tons," he said.
He noted that the airport would create around 1,200 direct jobs for technicians who would be trained and certified internationally.
The steps to be taken, he noted, included ensuring that the elements of the project met all codes related to civil aviation, with the partnership of a consulting firm.
He stressed that everything that was planned was done on site, and the next step is to have a set of procedures and people trained to operate all the systems.
The southern runway, where the Boeing 777 that left the 4 de Fevereiro International Airport landed, is already concluded. It is 4,000 metres long and 60 metres wide, while the northern runway is in the construction phase.
The coordinator of the airport's Operations Office announced that by June of next year the infrastructure will be delivered.
The new airport, which covers an area of 1,324 hectares, will have several services such as hotels, rail transport, Tax General Administration (AGT) posts, the Civil Protection and Fire Brigade Service and a car park with capacity for 1,000 vehicles.
The work to complete the infrastructure is within a planned budget of around US$3.4 billion.
The laying of the first stone for construction of the development was done in 2015. The airport is scheduled to launch its first passenger flight at the end of 2023, following completion of the certification process.
