12 Dec 2014

Sol Air may fly again to Bougainville

8:16 am on 12 December 2014

Solomon Airlines officials will be among the guests at this morning's re-opening of the Aropa airport in Papua New Guinea's autonomous province Bougainville which has been shut for 24 years.

The airport was forced to close by the civil war and a new airfield was later established in Buka.

The operations manager for Solomon Airlines, Gus Kraus, says his airline had actually set up an office in 1989 at Aropa and is looking to do so again.

"We are looking at the airport in terms of the future prospects of launching Dash 8 services to and from Honiara, maybe via Munda, if we get a decent terminal built there. Of course the major issues are always about customs, immigration and quarantine, man power and facilities and also about security."

Papua New Guinea's prime minister Peter O'Neill is leading the delegation flying in to Aropa for this morning's ceremony.