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South African Airways is looking to serve Maun, Botswana from Johannesburg. The two governments are negotiating a new set of bilateral air service agreements which would allow a South African carrier to run on that route which is currently served by Air Botswana.

South African Airways has ordered an additional five A320s for delivery beginning 2013.

South African has signed an agreement with Aircastle to lease six new A332s. The first aircraft is scheduled for delivery in 2011.

Air New Zealand and South African Airways have signed a codeshare agreement that will allow Air New Zealand to place its code on SAA service between Perth and Johannesburg, as well as onto their connecting domestic services to Cape Town, Durban, Port Elizabeth and East London. South African Airways will in turn place its code on Air New Zealand’s daily Auckland to Perth service and onto connecting Air New Zealand domestic flights to Wellington and Christchurch.

SAA has signed a memorandum of understanding with Airbus to lease six A332s to replace its ageing fleet of A342s beginning in 2013.

South African has increased service to Lagos, Douala and Buenos Aires as follows:
- Lagos, Nigeria will be served daily, up from 4x per week
- Douala, Cameroon will be served 3x per week, up from two
- Buenos Aires, Argentina will be served 3x per week, up from two

South African Airways will increase frequency on the Johannesburg, South Africa to Perth, Australia route to daily service on September 1.

South African Airways will begin service between Johannesburg, South Africa and Gaborone, Botswana on March 2, complementing existing service provided by South African Express. Flights will operate twice per day except for single flights on Saturdays using A319s.

SA032 JNB - GBE: 835 - 920 Daily
SA033 GBE - JNB: 1025 - 1115

SA038 JNB - GBE: 1555 - 1640 Daily except Saturday
SA039 GBE - JNB: 1730 - 1820

Virgin Atlantic Airways and South African Airways have expanded their partnership to code share on flights operated between Cape Town and London’s Heathrow Airport. While VS operates on the route during the northern winter (October - April), SAA operates flights year round.

South African Airways and TAP Portugal, both members of Star Alliance, announced a code share deal that covers TAP’s service between Lisbon, Portugal and Johannesburg, South Africa. Furthermore, TAP will place its code on SAA flights to Cape Town, Durban, Port Elizabeth and East London while SAA will place its code on TAP’s Portuguese destinations of Funchal, Faro and Porto.

South African will increase service and capacity on existing routes as follows:
- increase of frequency to Kinshasa, DRC from 4x to 6x per week
- increase of frequency to Libreville, Gabon from 2x to 3x per week
- introduce service to Douala, Cameroon, with onward service to Dakar, Sénégal
- introduce two weekly flights to Libreville that continue on to Abidjan and Dakar
- add one weekly flight to Perth, Australia

These increases are planned to be phased in within the next 6 months.

South African will reportedly begin service to Buenos Aires in April with an initial 2x weekly frequency, to be increase to 3x per week in July.

South African will add a fifth weekly flight to Mumbai, India from Johannesburg in October. Flights are operated with A342s.

As of March 30, South African Airways will place its code on daily service operated by Emirates between Cape Town and Dubai.

South African Airways last weekend increased its Johannesburg, South Africa to Entebbe, Uganda frequency to daily service.

South African will boost its capacity on African routes by 10% as part of a plan to bring the airline back to profitability. Increases are as follows:

- A fourth weekly flight to Luanda, Angola
- Nairobi will see an increase in frequency from 7x to 10x per week (as posted here a few months ago)
- Mauritius will see an increase in frequency from 7x tp 8x per week
- Larger aircraft will be used on some or all services to Entebbe, Dar Es Salaam, Kinshasa, Blantyre, Lilongwe, Windhoek

The airline will also re-route four out of seven flights per week to New York via Accra, Ghana, while the remaining three will be routed via Dakar.

South African Airways is to add three weekly flights from Johannesburg to Nairobi, Kenya, according to Business Daily Africa. The new flights, to be operated on Wednesdays, Fridays and Saturdays, will complement the airline’s existing daily service.

South African Airways announced today that it is embarking on a restructuring program that will last some 18 months. The program, which includes retrenchments, also calls for the grounding of six B744s as well as the closing of the Paris route as it is under-performing.

South African Airways and its Star Alliance partner United Airlines expanded their codeshare agreement on March 15 to include the following cities: Atlanta, Ga.; Austin, Texas; Charlotte, N.C.; Cleveland, Ohio; Columbus, Ohio; Dallas, Texas; Detroit, Mich.; Houston, Texas; Indianapolis, Ind.; Kansas City, Mo.; Miami, Fla.; Philadelphia, Pa.; Pittsburgh, Pa.; Raleigh-Durham, N.C.; and St. Louis, Mo.

South African Airways and Malaysia Airlines have signed a codeshare agreement which will see, pending government approval, each airline placing its code on domestic and regional flights operated by the other. The deal, which is set to take effect on June 1, will see South African’s code on Malaysia’s flights between Johannesburg and Kuala Lumpur, as well as domestic Malaysian and regional cities. Malaysian will also place its code on certain SA domestic and regional flights.

South African Airways and fellow Star Alliance partner All Nippon Airways will, subject to government approval, begin to code share on the former’s Johannesburg - Hong Kong route and the latter’s services between Hong Kong and Osaka.

South African Airways is reportedly dropping Zurich from its network at the end of April, in favour of operations via codeshare with its Star Alliance partner Swiss. Swiss International serves Johannesburg daily using A343s.

South African Airways is reportedly set to open routes to a number of cities in Africa, Europe and South America in 2007, in addition to the recently announced service to Chicago.
- Munich, Germany will be served 3x per week effective July
- Buenos Aires, Argentina will be served 3x per week
- Libreville, Gabon will be served 3x per week effective April
- Bamako, Mali will be served 2x per week
- Pointe Noire, Congo will be served 2x per week

Other cities under consideration are Rio de Janeiro in Brazil and Kilimanjaro in Tanzania.

No schedules have been posted at this time.

Flight International reports that South African Airways is looking to add A340s to its fleet to add frequency to London, Frankfurt and Sao Paul. These aircraft will likely be leased, given that Airbus does not have delivery slots until at least 2008. The airline is also reportedly planning to start service to Chicago in April.

South African Airways’ new low-cost domestic airline was launched as “Mango” on Monday. The airline will initially operate two B738s between Johannesburg and Cape Town, with anticipated increase to four by next year.