FEBRUARY 2023

February has shown steady growth in the number of aircraft registered. Four fixed wing and one helicopter were added while the non-type certified (NTCA) register grew by seven.

- MORNE BOOIJ-LIEWES

THERE ARE SOME LATE ADDITIONS included from January in this month’s updates that were not included in the previous month’s updates. The exports and deletions similarly show three entries from January.

It would seem there is not a month that passes where Airlink is not registering at least one new plane! This is testament to the carrier’s strong growth and sound leadership. Another of the carrier’s recently-acquired Embraer 175s has been registered, this one as ZS-YBF. The jet was delivered to Alitalia in 2012, registered EI-RDK and named ‘Parco Nazionale del Gargano’. It operated regional flights for the carrier until being withdrawn from use in April 2020 during the early part of the COVID pandemic.

Cemair too shows steady growth, with a CRJ200 returning to the carrier’s fleet after a lease in Sudan. ZS-CEM was delivered to Comair in August 1999 as N785CA and was operated on behalf of Delta Connect until being withdrawn from use and placed in storage in 2007. The aircraft was acquired by Cemair in 2012 and allocated the registration ZS-CMR. In 2019 the plane was transferred to Blue Bird Aviation Sudan and allocated the registration ST-BBA and is now reinstated on the local register, but as ZS-CEM, as its previous registration has since been allocated to a CRJ900 also operated by Cemair.

The cancelation of the registration of a former SA Express-operated CRJ200 regional jet, ZS-NMJ, is a bit of a mystery as the updates give the c/n as 7169 while all other sources claim this jet was c/n 7161. Perhaps this is just some “finger trouble” while entering the data?