Review of Air Tanzania flight from Mwanza to Dar es Salaam in Economy

the wings of kilimanjaro

Hello and welcome to another Flight Report!

This is the penultimate FR from my trip to Tanzania and will cover my last domestic flight within the country back to Dar-es-Salaam. This flight stop additionally at Kilimanjaro before continuing on to Dar. I chose this flight (and, to be honest, only went to Mwanza) specifically for Air Tanzania's A220 as I'm really curious what its like flying this (relatively new) aircraft type in Africa. Air Tanzania is the first (and largest) operator of the A220 on the continent with 4 A220-300s (as of the making of this FR). The airline has one of the newest fleets in Africa flying the Boeing 737 MAX 9, 787-8, and the Dash 8 alongside the Airbus. I actually find the airline's route map fascinating as it serves Guangzhou and Mumbai alongside its short haul network. The airline will also add Dubai, Muscat and London to its network in the future. 

But anyway, this will be my 2nd time on the A220 after a Swiss flight from Manchester to Zurich back in 2018. As for price, I paid $108, which includes a $12 service fee on top of the base fare. As usual, checked luggage and seat selection is included. 

I aim to offset all of my CO2 emission from flights. All emissions are calculated using the ICAO Carbon Emissions Calculator and I will be funding projects approved by The Gold Standard. The CO2 output for this flight is:

MWZ → JRO → DAR: 104kg
Total for 2024 (so far): 728kg

Video report

Here's the video version of this FR, it's got pretty much the same thing content wise. 

Mwanza international airport (MWZ)

Here we are, outside the terminal. The building itself is quite small (especially 'landside') so there's a ton of seating in a roofed area outside. 

There's a ticket and security check and here's the check-in area. Yup, it's only 3 desks and a scale 

Unlike Zanzibar, they actually managed to squeeze another security check after check-in, although it was really, really tight. 

Here's the waiting area airside. It's huge compared to the rest of the airport. It seems like a terrible use of space when check-in and security is so tight (there's only 1 gate, that door all the way at the front). 

the flight

Flight time initially to Kilimanjaro will be around 1 hour and here's our plane:

Some information about our plane:

Type: Airbus A220-300
Registration: 5H-TCH
First flight: 12 December 2018
Age: ~5 years
Config: C12/Y120

Named Dodoma (the capital of Tanzania), she was delivered new to Air Tanzania in 2018. She was impounded in August 2019 by South Africa in Johannesburg due to unpaid compensation by Tanzania state to a South African farmer, which is definitely one of the more interesting things I've read in the 'remarks' section on planespotter.net. She was also stored for a year in Maastricht (MST) between 2022 and 2023. I actually flew into MST in September 2022 and remember there being a lot of weird and exotic planes parked there. 

Quick photo of the business class seats I passed through. 

And here's the tray table and seatback pocket on the economy seats. All seats come with a USB charging port, which is really nice and unexpected for a short haul aircraft. 

The legroom - fairly good. 

As expected, each seat also reclines. 

First views out of the window. 

The overhead panel with the mini-screens (unique to the A220). It's a shame it wasn't used at all, I'm quite sure some airlines (like Swiss) use it to play the safety video. 

We were delayed slightly due to a wheelchair user. There isn't a lift here, which means that the ground crew had to manually lift him all the way up the stairs, which must've been exhausting (especially in this heat). 

Taxiing to the runway. 

Takeoff! Bye bye Mwanza!

Views of Lake Victoria.

It is the 2nd largest freshwater lake in the world, after Lake Superior in North America. 

Also, is that paint peeling off the side of the engine? Interesting… 

Lets have a look at the contents of the seatback pocket, which includes a safety card… 

… and an air sickness bag. An inflight magazine is also available but there wasn't any on my row unfortunately. 

Shortly after, the crew came around with a bottle of water, a wet wipe and… salted cashews! I've been given cashews on every flight in Tanzania, probably because of how common it is here (Tanzania's one of the top 10 producers of cashews globally). However, while I've had cashews on every flight, they vary quite a lot in quality. These are probably the worst of the 3 airlines (with Auric Air being the best), mainly because it is incredibly bland (I doubt they salted it much at all).  

Anyway, having thoroughly analyzed and ranked my flights in terms of Cashew Quality™, we're starting our descent into Kilimanjaro. 

Passing through some pretty thick clouds. 

First views of land.

On final approach. 

Welcome to Kilimanjaro International Airport! We arrived 10 minutes late. 

View of the terminal building. We will park here for around 40 minutes before continuing onward to Dar-es-Salaam. 

Taxiing back out to the runway 5 minutes early. 

Bye bye Kilimanjaro! Flight time to Dar will be around 40 minutes. 

The sun is starting to set as we head South. 

Once again, a bottle of water, wet wipes and packet of cashew nuts are handed out right after takeoff. I really didn't fancy eating 2 packets of flavorless cashews in a day so I just kept mine for later. 

Starting our descent into Dar. 

First views of the city. 

On final approach. 

Welcome back to Dar-es-Salaam! We arrived on time. 

Parked at the gate. 

Dar-es-salaam Julius Nyerere International Airport (DAR)

With how many times I had to type out that name, you'd think I'd know how to spell it by now… although there's waaay too many 'e's and 'r's next to each other for my liking haha. 

Walking to baggage reclaim. 

View of the apron with a nice sunset in the background. 

The baggage reclaim area. It took 15 minutes for my bag to arrive as it was one of the last. I guess with the way it was loaded, passengers from Mwanza had their bags at the very back with passengers from Kilimanjaro getting their bags first. 

View of the airport outside as I now walk to Terminal 3 to catch my flight back to Jeddah in 4 hours. 

I'll end this FR here. The next FR in this series will be the last one in covering my final flight to London on Saudia (although I'm changing the order that these FRs are getting published). There isn't one on my flight to Jeddah as I was waaaay to tired to take photos. Thanks for reading and see you soon! ;)