Alexandria will soon have a new airport and Cairo a new control tower, Amirah Ibrahim reports Egypt's Orascom Industries has won a $97 million contract with aviation authorities to expand Alexandria's Borg Al-Arab airport, replacing Al-Nozha airport. "The construction work will begin 1 August and is due to be completed within 22 months," explained Orascom's Chairman Nassef Sawiris. "The new terminal and renovation work of existing facilities will be ready for inauguration by 1 June 2009." In 2005, the Egyptian government obtained a $50 million soft loan from the Japanese government to upgrade the small airport of Borg Al-Arab, 43 km southwest of Alexandria, into its main airport. The LE309 million loan, at an interest rate of 1.5 per cent with a seven-year grace period, is payable over a 25-year period. Egypt's National Bank is providing a LE300 million loan. The sum also covers other areas such as telecommunications, water supply and sewage. According to Aviation Minister Ahmed Shafiq, an international tender a year ago chose the contractor. "Only eight groups applied and four of them qualified for the first phase in the tender. Orascom Egypt in cooperation with the Belgian building company BESIX won the bid." The project will add a new gateway to upgrade the airport's passenger and cargo handling capacity in response to growing demand, and in order to improve convenience and safety. "The Borg Al-Arab airport project involves the construction of a terminal with expanded capacity to handle a million passengers and 4,000 tonnes of cargo per year, as well as upgrading of existing facilities," stated Ibrahim Manna, head of the Holding Company for Airports. Borg Al-Arab airport opened in 1998 mainly to serve passengers from the Delta and to handle part of the growing cargo business that threatened to overwhelm Cairo Airport's capacities at the time. "This airport promises to provide the local population as well as foreign visitors and businessmen with a first-class facility in terms of safety, convenience and the volume of passengers and cargoes it is designed to deal with," Manna added. The site of the project is also an area where various industries, such as petrochemicals, metal refining, agriculture and tourism, have been expanding. In a separate contract, Orascom Construction also won the bid to build a new 125m air-traffic control tower at Cairo's international airport for $30 million. "The new apron control tower will act as the main tower for navigation at Cairo International which is served in present by two control towers," explained Air Navigation Company Chairman Ahmed Said. "It will follow the completion of Cairo airport's third terminal due to be inaugurated by mid-2008. The new control tower will operate navigation through the three terminals of the airport in a unified system." Cairo International Airport is now carrying out its biggest-ever expansion project, constructing a new terminal which will take the airport's capacity from nine million passengers per annum to 20 million passengers. The $280 million project is financed by the World Bank and construction is being carried out by Turkish TAV Construction Company. According to Said, seven specialised contractors applied for the tender but only three met the technical and financial criteria. Construction work began last month and should be completed by mid-2009. Cairo International's new control tower promises to be an amazing landmark, with a unique design covering 1000 sq metres. It contains the most high-tech computerised navigation system, communications, radar screens and control facilities.
