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Commenced operations | 24 September 2010 | ||||||
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Ceased operations | 10 October 2016 | ||||||
Headquarters | Brazzaville, Republic of the Congo | ||||||
Key people | Fatima Beyina-Moussa (CEO), Johan Maertens (Deputy CEO), Marco Villa (Director Strategy) |
Equatorial Congo Airlines SA, operating as ECAir, was an airline headquartered in Brazzaville; it was the flag carrier of the Republic of the Congo. The airline suspended all operations on 10 October 2016.
ECAir was created with the support of the Congolese Government to serve as a locomotive for the modernization of the aviation sector in the region. Crews and technical support for ECAir were provided by Geneva-based VIP business carrier PrivatAir. and thus ECAir avoided being included in the list of air carriers banned in the European Union, which applied to all airlines with maintenance services executed in the Republic of the Congo.
Operations commenced on 24 September 2010, the company having taken delivery of its first aircraft, a Boeing 737-300. It took delivery of a second Boeing 737-300 in February 2012. On 24 August 2012 ECAir launched its first international route, Brazzaville – Paris-CDG, offering 4-weekly service on board a PrivatAir Boeing 757 aircraft.
On 14 November 2014 the Belgian airline Jetairfly sealed a wet-lease deal to provide up to four aircraft with crew to operate on behalf of ECAir from mid 2015 on. Widebody operations were launched in February 2015 with the wet-lease of a Boeing 767-300ER from PrivatAir to be used on the Brazzaville to Paris service (4-weekly service). The delivery of a Boeing 787-8 was expected in the first half of 2016, with plans to open new routes to China and the United States.
The airline suspended all operations on 10 October 2016 until further notice after the responsible air navigation provider ceased all services to EC Air over unpaid debts.PrivatAir, which operated several routes on behalf of ECAir, also ended all services for the airline.