90% of the Entebbe Airport expansion is complete as passenger traffic increases.
While addressing a press conference at Entebbe International Airport on Friday, Mr.Fred Bamwesigye the director general of the Uganda Civil Aviation Authority noted that the overall project works at Entebbe airport are at 90 percent level of completion and the other pending work is expansion of Apron 1, which is at 95 percent level of completion.
“The major remaining project is the 20,000 square meters terminal building, currently under construction to connect to the existing terminal building and is at 60 percent level of completion,” Mr Bamwesigye added.
He noted that among the previously finished tasks under the $200 million project, carried out by China Communications Construction Company (CCCC), are the resurfacing of runways 17/35 and 12/30 along with their respective taxiways. Additionally, a Cargo Centre with a capacity of 100,000 tonnes was constructed, and Aprons 2 and 4 were resurfaced.
He further explained that upon the completion of the new terminal building, scheduled for 2024, the terminal’s capacity will be expanded from its previous maximum of two million passengers per year to at least 3.5 million passengers. This expansion aims to alleviate the increasing traffic demands.
Mr BAmwesigye revealed that in March, 2024, Entebbe International Airport handled 80,719 arriving and 91,271 departing passengers, a total of 171,990 international passengers, an average of 5,548 passengers per day.
He adds that 2023 recorded a total of 1.93 million passengers in comparison to the pre-COVID 19 pandemic figure of 1.8 million passengers in 2019. The new facilities and on going projects are meant to address the growing traffic.
Regarding the recent intense rainfall in Entebbe that resulted in flooding of a portion of the airport parking lot on April 6, 2024 owing to backflow, Mr. Bamwesigye stated that the videos that went viral sadly gave the false impression that the situation persisted for the majority of the day, even though the water subsided in 30 to 45 minutes.
