Air Seychelles, the State-owned national flag carrier for the Indian Ocean archipelagic nation, released its operational report for 2022 on Monday. The airline described 2022 as having been “filled with determination, resilience and hard work”. It was also marked, in November, by the company emerging from administration (equivalent to business rescue in South Africa, or Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection in the US). And in December it introduced a new seasonal route to Almaty in Kazakhstan, which covers the northern winter period and will be operated until March this year, to total 18 roundtrips (36 separate flights).

The airline operates a fleet of two new-generation, 168-seat, Airbus A320-200neo (neo = new engine option) single-aisle jet airliners and five, 19-seat, De Havilland Canada DHC-6 Twin Otter twin turboprop ‘feederliners’. The A320neos serve on international, and the Twin Otters on domestic, routes. Both types undertake both scheduled and charter flights.

Based on the Seychelles’ main island of Mahé, the carrier serves four international destinations with year-round scheduled services – Johannesburg, Mauritius, Mumbai and Tel Aviv, of which Johannesburg and Tel Aviv are the most popular. Domestically, it operates up to 30 scheduled flights a day between Mahé and the country’s second biggest island, Praslin. In 2022 it also operated international charter flights to 35 destinations, including Beijing, Bucharest, Dakar and London. Domestically, it operates charters to various islands in the country, not covered by its scheduled services.

In total numbers, Air Seychelles carried 74 272 passengers on its international routes last year, a 172% jump over the figure of 27 319 recorded in 2021. The most popular destination was Johannesburg, followed closely by Tel Aviv. The carrier did not provide numbers for its individual routes, however. Domestic air passenger traffic also increased significantly last year, up 45% from 2021’s number of 98 005 to 2022’s 141 973. The airline’s international air cargo business (both exports and imports) also grew, reaching 10 043 t, which was a 35% increase over the 7 430 t achieved in 2021.

In terms of the number of international scheduled flights it operated, these totalled 851 last year, as against 361 in 2021. These were broken down into Johannesburg, 275 (158 in 2021); Tel Aviv, 277 (2021: 144); Mauritius, 177 (2021: 38); Mumbai, 119 (2021: 21); and Almaty, three (2021: zero). However, on-time performance declined a little last year, by 2% compared with 2021. The carrier attributed this to post-Covid-19-pandemic understaffing in ground-handling companies at the airports it served.

“We’re excited to report on the strength of the commercial and operational performance at Air Seychelles,” enthused airline acting CEO Sandy Benoiton. “Even though 2022 was still subject to the effects of [Covid-19-]Omicron in quarter one, the team achieved great results that we can all be proud of. We’ve returned to all of our previous markets, and added new destinations like Almaty. Additionally, we continue to diversify our international flying unit with a strong focus on [our aircraft, crew, maintenance and insurance business, or wet leasing] and charters, helping us to balance any risk associated with the economy, strong oil prices or any Covid-related travel downturn.”

The airline plans to release its financial performance report for 2022 quite soon.