Kenya’s national carrier made its inaugural direct flight from Jomo Kenyatta international airport (JKIA) in Nairobi

To John Fitzgerald Kennedy (JFK) international airport in New York city. Nicknamed “the Zambezi River,” the Dreamliner 787?8 has an augmented two sets of crew with a passenger capacity of 234. With it, Kenya will join the elite global airlines with a landing slot at the prestigious JFK airport, the fifth Sub-Saharan Africa country to fly directly to the US after South Africa, Ethiopia, Ghana and Nigeria. Cape Verde also flies directly to the US.KQ joins the likes of Singapore airlines, who recently launched an inaugural 19?hour non?stop flight from Singapore to New York on a new airbus a350?900. Upon assessment, testing and auditing, JKIA was granted category one status by the US federal aviation administration in February to commence direct flights from Nairobi to New York. The direct flights will link Kenya and Africa in general to the West Indian coast and the Western hemisphere consisting of the Americas, parts of Eurasia, Russia, Oceania and Antarctica. They will grow trade ties and volumes between Kenya and the US thereby augmenting efforts by government to reduce the existing trade imbalance in favor of the US. According to trade statistics, aggregate trade between us and Kenya last year amounted to sh102.2 billion, with us exports to Kenya totaling sh57.2 billion while Kenya’s exports to the us amounted to sh45 billion.