The Moroccan Airports Authority (French: Office National Des Aéroports, ONDA, Arabic: المكتب الوطني للمطارات) is the Moroccan airport operator and administrator. The company headquarters are based in Mohammed V International Airport in Casablanca.
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ONDA was established in July 1990 under parliamentary law 14-89. Prior to then, Morocco's airports were administered by the Moroccan Ministry of transport.
One year later, ONDA inaugurated Al Massira Airport in Agadir.
On September 15, 2003, Abdelhanine Benallou, was nominated as new general manager of ONDA.
Although Morocco has its share in aircraft accidents, the number of serious incidents with fatalities directly related to an airport (approach, take-off or on ground accidents) are very low. The total number of accidents with fatalities in Morocco is 19, resulting in 792 deaths.[1] The same numbers for events directly related to airports are 5 resp. 171.[2]
The majority of the airport related incidents are long ago, the last incident in 1986.
ONDA helped in supervising the construction of Yasser Arafat International Airport which Mohammed V International Airport is twinned with. It also organized training programs for Palestinian engineers in Morocco in 1997 just months before the inauguration of the airport in Gaza in December 1998.
In Mars 14, 2003, ONDA signed a partnership agreement with Côte d'Azur International Airport, Nice, France.
Around 2004 ONDA created a masterplan to upgrade many facilities by 2010. The main projects are: (the planned completion date in brackets)[3]
Apart from these larger plans some other smaller changes are planned around many airports around the country.
As the national operator for all public airports in Morocco the information they publish on flight-movements give a strong indication of the development of visitors and flights to the country. Also the cargo-figures tell something about the economy.
The ONDA publishes monthly reports which contain number of passengers per airport and a over-all total of aircraft-movements (landings and take-offs) and cargo figures for the whole country.
Despite the international crisis, which hits Europe and North-America the most, the Moroccan airport authority reports continously increasing passenger-numbers, aircraft-movements and processed cargo.
The summer-months are by far the busiest months for passangers. Not only tourists traveling to the main tourist locations as Marrakesh and Agadir see high volumes of passengers, also the airports in the North of Morocco see increasing passenger-numbers. Moroccans who live in Europe tend to visit family during the summer and although many of them still come over by ferry increasing numbers of people come by air. Othet indications of this are for example:
The increase in passengers overall in 2010, compared to 2009 was +14,93%[4] and this trend continued in 2011 - although not as spectacular. The year-on-yar growth in passengernumbers in July 2011 was still +6,28%[5]
The main international airport, Mohammed V in Casablanca takes over 40% of all aircraft movements (landings and take-offs) and the 2nd airport, Marrakesh, takes another 15%[4][5]
Unlike the passanger-numbers the amount of cargo to and from Moroccan airports is quite stable after an initial drop around 2008.
By far the majority of traffic comes from Europe, where France is responsible for 30-35% of all traffic and the rest of Europe produces 40-45% of all trafic. Domestic flights are responsible for 10% of traffic. Other destinations to/from Morocco are North-America (2-2,5%), Middle & Far-East (5%) and Arfica (Maghreb: 3,5; rest of Africa: 6%)[4][5]