March 8 is International Women’s Day, and Ethiopian Airlines, the Ethiopian national flag carrier, will be marking the day with an all-women flight crew from Addis Ababa to Stockholm and Oslo. The historic flight will be operated by Ethiopian Airlines women professionals from flight deck all the way to the ground. In other words, the airport operations, flight dispatch, load control, ramp operation, onboard logistics, safety and security, catering as well as air traffic control, will be carried out entirely by women, reports the ENA. Ethiopian Airlines Group CEO, Tewolde GebreMariam said the flight is to honour women for their vital contributions to the aviation industry.“We are immensely honoured that we have women trailblazers in every aspect of our aviation field. Women are an integral part of our success story from the start and with this dedicated flight we honour and celebrate their indispensable contribution to our aviation Group and the broader aviation industry, our country and the continent at large.“Although women are Africa’s greatest resource, gender inequality still persists in our continent. Therefore, we all need to ensure that women take their rightful position in all human endeavour by creating the right conditions and through all-inclusive engagement models,” he said. The all-women flight will have as a theme: “All women functioned flight to operate from the continent of African to meet with their counterparts in Europe to show the power of women to the world.”Last year, the national carrier announced the deployment of an all-female crew for their flight from Ethiopia to Buenos Aires, Argentina to mark and celebrate International Women’s Day.
The state-owned flag carrier had before that broken barriers when it deployed an all-female crew for a special flight from Bole International Airport in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia to Murtala Mohammed International Airport in Lagos, Nigeria. Founded in 1945 by Emperor Haile Selassie, Ethiopian Airlines is one of a few profitable national carriers operating in sub-Saharan Africa. It is a member of the Star Alliance and one of the fastest-growing airlines in the global aviation industry. With its operational hub at the Bole International Airport in Addis Ababa, Ethiopian Airlines operates flights to more than 113 passenger destinations, with an additional 35 destinations for freights. The Ethiopian carrier has secondary hubs in Togo and Malawi, and has resuscitated non-operational airlines including Zambia’s, and also collaborated with airlines in Chad and Mozambique. The multi-award-winning airline, with its modernized fleet, new aircraft maintenance hangars, and world-class in-flight catering facility has, over the years, experienced rapid growth, increased profitability, and made an outstanding contribution to aviation development in Africa, registering an average growth of 25% in the past seven years. In 2016, the airline reported a net profit of $265 million. The results reflected an 18 per cent increase in passenger numbers over the year. The airline, last December, announced a collaboration with the European Union to establish an international business school under the Airline’s Aviation Academy which will be delivering an MBA programme.