British Airways passengers on an Airbus A380 from Johannesburg to London Heathrow went on a 10-hour “flight to nowhere” when Niger’s airspace was suddenly closed late on Sunday night. Other flights between the UK and South Africa have being re-routed or diverted to take on extra fuel or have returned to their starting points as a result of the closure. Airspace over Sudan and Libya is already closed to commercial aviation. The addition of Niger means there is now a block to north-south flights across Africa stretching around 2,600 miles from western Niger to the Red Sea.
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","author_name":"The Independent"}