Plans are afoot for President Uhuru Kenyatta to to charter a Kenya Airways (KQ) flight to New York where he is expected to attend the 73rd United Nations General Assembly.
The General Assemby is scheduled to open on September 18th.
With the national carrier expected to begin direct flights to New York on October 28, it is hoped that Uhuru's September trip will boost traveller and investor confidence.
Officials from the US Federal Aviation administration (FAA) have already pitched camp in the country training Kenya Airways and Kenya Airports Authority (KAA) staff.
KQ Chief Executive Sebastian Mikosz confirmed that officials had been sent over from the US to oversee implementation of a raft of changes including enhanced security and surveillance systems.
[caption caption="Kenya Airways CEO Sebastian Mikosz"]
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“My expectation will be that by the end of August we will have all the administrative papers issues. When we looked at how it was done for all the other airlines, most of the official documents arrive few weeks before its launch.
“The authorities are checking the consistency so they just moved some of their staff from the U.S here to overlook and be with us during the last 90 days before the flight operates and stay with us for a few months when the flight is operating so we can transfer the knowledge,” he stated.
It was further revealed that part of the training involved the use of new scanners deployed to beef up security at the Jomo Kenyatta International Airport (JKIA) which recently achieved Category 1 status.
"Its a very big logistical operation particularly that no carrier from Kenya is operating directly to the U.S so we are setting a precedence in the region so there is a lot of attention also from the U.S side," he added.
Mikosz further noted that they would intensify a marketing push for the direct flights, remaining optimistsic that the maiden flight would be a success.
[caption caption="A Kenya Airways plane"]
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