the (broken) wings of Kilimanjaro- what really happened…
December 29, 2019
This happened on flight TC137 from Kilimanjaro to Zanzibar…
Today I was going to fly to Zanzibar for the next part of the trip. I got to check in on time and everything was normal at first. The airport was very clean and modern and it had a really nice terrace on the second floor with a good view, although it was hot and completely deserted. (Unfortunately I wasn’t able to post my footage of the upstairs area)
When I got to the terminal, I got an amazing view of what I think are the two most beautiful airplanes ever built- the A350 and the 787. The A350 was from Ethiopian airlines and the 787 from Qatar airways.
The flight was supposed to depart at 3:00 pm. It had already the time where the plane would normally have arrived, but it still didn’t show up. I then saw the beginning of my fate with Air Tanzania, when a few people questioned the staff at the check in counter about why the plane hasn’t arrived and what time it departs. Then there was more waiting. I heard from someone that the plane would depart at 4 instead, meaning so far it will be a one hour delay. I thought to myself that an hour of a delay can’t be so bad, but other passengers had something else in mind. It seemed like many people were impatient and at the time I didn’t understand why. Delays are always annoying, but I was never prepared for what was about to happen next….
I wasn’t sure where I got this information from, whether is was a passenger talking to a staff member or an actual announcement, but I heard that the flight would be delayed until 4.
One full hour went by as me and other passengers were getting more and more anxious. It was then 4:00 and there was still no sign of the plane. To distract my anxiety from the delay, I just looked out of the window as it was the most entertaining activity. I was quite surprised how busy it was and I even got some rare catches such as a Dash 7! I didn’t know those were still flying so it was a surprise to see one.
At this point there was still not a sign of the plane. Downstairs, the drama started. Passengers kept getting more and more angry and were now starting to crowd around the staff. At this point I was getting frustrated because this same thing has happened in American Airlines, where an announcement calls a certain departure time and this time passes and it creates more and more delays. And this is exactly what happened. They told us that the flight would leave at 4, but it didn’t. We waited another hour and people were getting furious. Another long hour went by and yet once again, they kept announcing new times for the flight to leave but the plane never arrived. I could not believe that I was in a travel nightmare. To make it worse, there was practically a riot going on downstairs. This is when all hell broke loose and the situation rapidly escalated into something that I’ve only seen on youtube videos of airport freak outs. I went back upstairs to escape the chaos, but at the same time I was attracted to the drama, maybe because I was just another annoyed and anxious passenger.
It was then when I realized that the Kilimanjaro airport does not have enough amenities because it wasn’t built for delays like this. Literally every other flight arrived and departed within less than an hour. It was so frustrating seeing so many flights departing on time and with extremely quick operations, while we were just stuck there, being told that the flight will leave when it actually never even arrived. Downstairs ,the scene was getting more wild. At this point, there was not one, but many different clusters of angry passengers who demanded their money back and to get the manager. There was no customer service desk and the staff were very unprofessional. They couldn’t handle all the backlash from passengers and kept disappearing. When they came back, there were still no answers.
Meanwhile, it had been more than three hours and there were multiple flights that were departing to Zanzibar. This is when I wished I would’ve flown with Precision Air instead. However we weren’t convinced to book a new ticket in another airline, even though I strongly had a gut feeling that we would never get out if we stayed on this flight. There was another flight in Air Tanzania that we tried to get on. The lady at the check in counter denied our permission onto that flight, claiming that it was full. At first, I just assumed that she was lying because that’s the impression that I have been getting from the staff. I kept checking flightradar24 for updates about the flight and the status of the plane remained unknown.
It didn’t occur to me why the passengers were so angry until I found out why. Apparently, they were supposed to get on a different flight and they have been here since the morning! Keep in mind that I got to the airport around 2, but others were already stuck here for hours and now they had to waste their entire day. It was then when the scene reached it’s climax. I swear in my life that I have never seen people this angry in an airport! I mean we are talking F-bombs, insults, “get your manager”, “I demand my money back”, and at this point there wasn’t one crowd, but many different ones. For once I felt really bad for the crew. The amount of backlash that they had to put up with from those savage passengers was just the next level.
I thought of stealing the microphone and making a public announcement saying: “Everybody calm down!”, because if these passengers weren’t so impulsive, they would have realized it sooner: That the riots of angry passengers were not making the situation any better. In fact, I’d say this caused it to escalate much more. At this point, there were multiple parties to blame: The airline for being such a disorganized mess, and I strongly believe that the passengers played a huge part in causing more drama. It was a confusing situation, but only got more complicated. One time, I was witnessing an argument where it sounded like the manager was not willing to accommodate passengers a place to stay for the night. This of course made passengers, including myself, really fed up. The thought of us having to spend the night in this tiny airport with no facilities was starting to become a reality. Although the ‘manager’ kept reassuring us the flight will depart later on that night, of course we didn’t want to put up with any more of this so we didn’t trust him. However, there was one thing that the airline did do that was actually very sweet. They provided us a free meal and gave us vouchers. I wasn’t sure if the vouchers were a good idea because it reminded me of my worst travel experience yet, however one thing was for sure: they were providing us with dinner.
Since the airport did not have enough facilities inside the terminal, we were given a card that gave us permission to go outside to a nearby restaurant and back to the terminal once we were done. I was actually quite impressed with the meal service. The restaurant had to deal with a lot of pressure to provide these ‘hangry’ passengers with a free buffet. And although I thought this was great, the other passengers were still so upset that they weren’t convinced. However, I then noticed that it quickly ran out and not everybody was able to get food (ouch).
It was also at this restaurant where the real manager was called and we found out the reason for the delays. Turns out it was way more complicated than I ever imagined. Allow me to explain how Air Tanzania works in order to understand it. The airline only has about 12 planes, consisting of Q400s, A220s, and 787s . Our plane was supposed to be one of the only four Q400s in the entire fleet, but it was broken. Another thing about this airline is that they have too many flights for the amount of planes that they have. Their flights all make multiple stops, adding to the confusion. So what the manager was saying was that there were also passengers stranded in Daar es Salaam ( I’m pretty sure they were supposed to take the same aircraft), so once one of the only Q400s left was finally available, it would have to make a stop there first to pick up those passengers and they would get off here. We would then take that plane to Zanzibar. Now, here is what I don’t understand: Why does the airline think it is a good idea to have so many routes, none of which are direct, and only have a few planes in their entire fleet? I guess they didn’t think clearly about the damage that even one faulty plane can cause. I mean, look at Uganda airlines- similar to Air Tanzania, they used to be a successful airline, then went bankrupt, and are just now starting over again. And yes, Uganda airlines has an even smaller fleet (I believe there are just 9 planes which are all CRJ900s), but they have direct flights to multiple African cities and I’ve heard nothing but good things about their performance and service.
It was at that moment when I realized, what kind of an airline is run like Air Tanzania? They are so disorganized and unprofessional, and I strongly believe that their approach to an airline business model has been poorly executed.
Fast forward a few more hours. We had dinner and were back in the terminal. It has been about 7 hours since the flight was supposed to leave. In fact there were no other planes at the tarmac. Soon after, I saw a plane landing. It was really dark so I couldn’t tell what just landed but this had to be it. The internet was back up on my phone and I was able to track an Air Tanzania plane that appeared to be arriving in Kilimanjaro. I was certain that this was the right plane so I went around showing some other passengers that it was arriving. Some were relieved but others didn’t believe me. I then had another terrifying thought. What if this flight wasn’t for us? What if it was a different flight that wasn’t going to Zanzibar. I couldn’t think of us having to spend the night here, but luckily, we were called for boarding. And yes, it was the right flight. I was so relieved to finally get on this plane. However, what happened next made me question their moral values. Instead of calling the passengers who have been waiting the entire day to get on the 50 minute flight to Zanzibar, they first called the passengers on my flight who weren’t stuck here for nearly as long. This meant that the passengers who have been waiting since early in the morning would have to wait for the flight to go to Zanzibar and come back to pick them up. By that time they would have had spent about 24 hours in this tiny airport! Who knows, the flight could’ve never taken off again. The future of these other passengers was unknown, and even though I was glad to finally get on the flight, I was in utter shock by how wrong and unethical these passengers were being treated.
The flight was pretty uneventful. Although I was sitting in front of the propeller, it was too dark to see anything. The seats were surprisingly comfortable compared to the ones on the flight I took before this one. However the flight attendants were a bit rude. As I got up to use the toilet (the plane was still sitting on the tarmac with both engines off), the flight attendant barked at me to sit down. I waited and when she was not looking, I got up and went to the toilet. It was slightly better than on the other flight, but as soon as I got out, the flight attendant saw me and once again yelled directly in my face to sit down. (Geez!) On any other flight in any other airline, they wouldn’t have said a thing, (from my experience at least). I tried going to sleep, but between the noise in the cabin and my thoughts and prayers to the people who were still waiting in Kilimanjaro, it was hard to do so. Once I was sleeping, the flight attendant suddenly woke me up. I am used to having undisturbed sleep and in this case I felt like I was being forced to use the airline’s service, which I thought was also a bit rude. I would have been different If I hadn’t been wearing a seatbelt of had by seat reclined at the wrong time. But in this case, she abruptly woke me up just so that I could be served. That is an unethical tactic to use, so of course, I was not impressed with the friendliness of the crew. In an act of rebel, I refused their offer as politely as I could. Luckily it was a short flight and we made it to Zanzibar.
Finally, after midnight, we arrived in our hotel in Stone Town. And boy was I glad it was over.
In summary, it was more than just an 8 hour delay for a 50 minute flight. In fact, it was way more than just the delay. An airline’s quality is determined by much more than the flight iteslf. As this experience goes to show, Air Tanzania is the lowest in the low in both areas. These were some of the rudest crew I’ve had on any flight. This was probably the most disorganized airline I’ve ever flown on, with some of the most unprofessional airline staff I’ve ever seen. I am in shock about how bad this experience was and to this day, it is one of my worst yet. I can’t believe that an airline like this exists. Will I fly Air Tanzania again?
Like I have a choice! If I did have the option to switch airlines for the flight back home, I definitely would. Unfortunately the tickets for this trip were booked months in advance, so the only thing I can do is give the airline a second chance on the flight home.
I hope this post wasn’t too harsh. As always, I try to give my honest opinion about my experiences, whether good or bad. But this goes to show that there are flawed airlines out there, and Air Tanzania is on my list of the three worst.
Carlo's Travels and Reviews 