N'djili Airport (IATA:FIH,ICAO:FZAA) (French:Aéroport de N'djilipronounced[a.e.ʁɔ.pɔʁdən‿dʒi.li]), also known asN'Djili International Airport andKinshasa International Airport (FrenchAéroport international de N'Djili orAéroport international de Kinshasa), serves the city ofKinshasa and is the largest of the five international airports in theDemocratic Republic of the Congo (DRC). It is named after the nearbyNdjili River.[1]
The airport was inaugurated in 1959, mainly used as a secondary hub forSABENA until 1960 when the Democratic Republic of the Congo became independent, then becoming a major hub forAir Congo.
In June 2015, a new international terminal was opened which can service one million passengers per year. Some computerized upgrades to the arrivals terminal have been implemented in recent years, although corruption remains a problem.[3][4]
On 28 August 1984,Vickers Viscount 9Q-CPD of Zaire Aero Service crashed after takeoff.[34]
On 15 April 1997, shortly before Zaire was renamed as the Democratic Republic of Congo, aDouglas DC-3 was hijacked at N'djili Airport. There were six to eight hijackers.[35]
On 13 January 2006, in the ZS-FUN, Learjet 24F accident, an Air Ambulance mission operated by SOS Air Rescue Africa, ZS-FUN was on final approach and cleared to land for a medical evacuation. Upon touchdown the left undercarriage collapsed due to a recent rain which caused an aquaplane. Both pilots and medical crew survived without injury. A secondary aircraft was dispatched after the accident to transfer the patient to Johannesburg, South Africa. The mentioned aircraft remained in Kinshasa for repairs and sold afterwards.[36]
On 21 June 2010,Hewa Bora Airways Flight 601, operated byMcDonnell Douglas MD-82 9Q-COQ burst a tyre on take-off. Hydraulic systems and port engine were damaged and the nose gear did not lower when the aircraft returned to N'djili. All 110 people on board escaped uninjured. The airline blamed the state of the runway for the accident, but investigators found no fault with the runway.[38]
On 4 April 2011, aCanadair CRJ-100ER 4L-GAE ofGeorgian Airways operating under an UN mission as flight 834 fromBangoka International Airport,Kisangani to Kinshasamissed the runway on landing at Kinshasa. The aircraft subsequently broke into pieces and caught fire. Only one survivor was reported out of 29 passengers and 4 crew. The airport was experiencing torrential rain, thunderstorms and low visibility at the time.[39]
On 20 December 2018 aGomair An-26 registration 9S-AGB crashed 19 nautical miles short of Kinshasa with 7 or 8 people on board. The aircraft was found more than 24 hours later by a local. The aircraft was carrying election materials on behalf of the Central Electoral National Independent Commission (CENI).[40]
This article incorporatespublic domain material from the Air Force Historical Research Agency
Media related toN'djili Airport at Wikimedia Commons
