Work on Kagamuga continuing

THE National Airports Corporation is working to ensure that the 1,290m Kagamuga Airport runway is open in time for the peak festive period, says chief operating officer Manuai Kametan.
Kametan mentioned this in Mt Hagen last week after inspecting the 180-meter dilapidated pavement section of the runway.
“The impact of the work here is reducing the runway length therefore stopping the operations of the F100 and F70 into Mt Hagen,” he said.
“Now we are limited to the Q400 and ATR-72.”
“In the past, we have been accommodating pressure from the industry, particularly airlines.
“They want the airport to be opened quickly so that they can continue the operation. But when we try to accommodate that, these kind of problems occur.
“These are some of the factors that caused the pavement to fail prematurely as well because of the demand from the operators and political pressure for us to get it done and out of the way so operations become normal.”
Kametan was accompanied by Civil Aviation Development Investment Programme (Cadip) director Wellington Warren, general manager engineering Simon Rouaia and general manager regional airports Alphonse Dresok.
Work on the 180m defect is expected to be completed this month depending on the weather.
“In terms of peak period, safety becomes a concern to us,” Kametan said.
“Our challenge is to finish the work as soon as we can, so that there is minimum impact during the peak period.
“We know that currently we are entering the peak period but when it comes to pavement repairs, we can’t compromise safety, we must do the work properly.”