Sir Seretse Khama International Airport

Sir Seretse Khama International Airport
Sir Seretse Khama International Airport
IATA: GBE – ICAO: FBSK GBE Location of the airport in Botswana
Summary
Airport type	Public
Operator	Civil Government
Serves	Gaborone
Location	Gaborone, Botswana
Elevation AMSL	3,299 ft / 1,006 m
Coordinates	24°33′19″S 25°55′06″E / 24.55528°S 25.91833°E
Runways

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Sir Seretse Khama International Airport (IATA: GBE, ICAO: FBSK) located 15 kilometres (9 mi) north of Gaborone is the main international airport of the capital city of Botswana. The airport is named for Sir Seretse Khama, the first president of Botswana.^[2] It was opened in 1984 and offers large capacity to handle regional and international traffic and has the largest passenger movement in the country.

[edit] Overview

Time: GMT +2.
Transfer to the city: Hotel minibuses and taxis (travel time 15 minutes). No scheduled bus service.
Car rental: Avis, Budget and Europcarl.
Facilities: One terminal building with Barclays Bank bureau de change, bar and restaurant, left luggage facility and duty-free shop for flights outside the Southern African Customs Union; (South Africa, Lesotho, Swaziland).

[edit] Expansion

The government of Botswana has started a US$61 million expansion plan to further develop the airport to accommodate increased traffic and larger planes^[3]

The contractor for this project is SinoHydro Corporation, headquartered in China. The goal of the project is to provide the airport with increased capacity for the 2010 FIFA World Cup in nearby South Africa.

[edit] Fatal crash

On October 11, 1999, an Air Botswana captain, Chris Phatswe, boarded a parked ATR-42 aircraft A2-ABB in the early morning and took off. Once in the air, he asked by radio to speak to the president, Air Botswana's general manager, the station commander, central police station and his girlfriend, among others. Because the president was out of the country, he was allowed to speak to the vice president. In spite of all attempts to persuade him to land and discuss his grievances, he stated he was going to crash into some planes on the apron. After a total flying time of about 2 hours, he did two loops and then crashed at 200 knots (370 km/h; 230 mph) into Air Botswana's two other ATR-42s parked on the apron. The captain was killed but there were no other casualties.

Airline sources say the pilot had been grounded on medical reasons, refused reinstatement and regrounded until February 2000. Air Botswana operations were crippled, as the airline temporarily only had one plane left – a BAe 146 which was grounded with technical problems.^[4]