INTERAIR South Africa
has closed down after
ending its last remaining
operation – a codeshare
with Air Austral between
Johannesburg and Réunion
– at the end of April,
confirms ceo, Gary Tokoph.
This follows the
termination of the airline’s
last remaining scheduled
operation to Ndola, Zambia,
in May last year and the
death of its chairman and
director, David Tokoph, in a
plane crash in New Mexico,
US in August last year.
This week, Gary confirmed
that all Interair flights had
been cancelled and that all
Interair flight data (airline
code D6) on the GDSs had
been blocked. He said the
airline handed back its
licences to the International
Air Service Licensing
Council.
He was not prepared to
comment on the reasons
for the airline’s demise, nor
on his future plans.
Interair’s codeshare
partner, Air Austral, stopped
receiving passenger name
lists from the airline at the
end of April. It had received
no official notification that
the airline had closed
down and Interair was not
responding to queries from
its codeshare partner.
However, Interair’s
commercial manager, Deon
Visagee, said all D6 flight
data would be removed
from the GDSs after he
received notification on
June 28 from Airline Tariff
Publishing Company (ATPC)
– the data supplier of
all major pricing engines
– that all Interair flight
data had been removed,
effective June 24. TNW is
in possession of an email
confirming this from ATPC
senior business analyst,
Kelly Garrison. Amadeus
senior manager marketing
& communications, Jannine
Adams, also confirmed all
D6 flights had been
suspended in Amadeus.
Meanwhile, Deon said
all Interair’s passenger
payments had been
processed through BSP and
Hahn Air would be notified
to terminate its eticketing
partnership with Interair. He
said the airline’s assets,
including a B737, were in
the process of being sold.
Jeweller, Robbie Schwartz,
started Interair in 1994 as
part of the Interjet group
of companies. It initially
operated domestic services,
expanding to regional
services in April 1995.
In 1997, it was saved from
insolvency by David Tokoph,
a US citizen from El Paso,
Texas, who was previously
md of Aero Zambia and who
was repeatedly linked by
the media to arms dealing
in Africa.
As an Iata member,
Interair operated scheduled
regional services and
charters from Johannesburg
to West Africa and
Zambia.
