Kenya Airways rises 10 places in global aviation ranking

By Peter Mburu

Kenya Airways (KQ) has risen 10 places in the latest global ranking of airlines to position 79, trailing its regional rival Ethiopian Airlines that ranked among the top 50 carriers.

Skytrax World Airline Awards had placed KQ in the 89th position in its previous report that ranks the world’s best airlines.

Ethiopian Airlines, which rose nine places to position 37 and South African Airways (67) were the best African national carriers in the top 100 list despite SAA dropping 21 places from the 2019 ranking.

Air Maroc of Morocco is the fourth-best regional airline in the continent followed by Air Mauritius, Air Seychelles and RwandAir. They were followed by FlySafair of South Africa, Egyptair and British/South African-based carrier Fastje, making the top ten African airlines.

The 2021 Skytrax awards covered the period from September 2019 to July 2021 with the results reflecting a mix of normal and pandemic travel.

Overall, Qatar Airways was named the best airline in the world, a title it has won six times since 2001, followed by Singapore Airlines. Japan’s All Nippon Airways came third.

This article originally appeared in The East African.

Photo: NMG