A modern aircraft, Fusion 212, is set to be inaugurated at Nyaribo Airstrip in Nyeri county on December 4.
Captain Godwin Wachira of Flight Training Center Limited said the flight, to be inaugurated by its Hungarian manufacturer, will be used for training purposes.
Wachira said the aircraft has been bought by Flight Training Center and it is the only one of that kind in Africa.
The new aircraft has a glass cockpit which is used by modern airliners and aircrafts.
“This aircraft, apart from using aviation fuel, can also use automotive fuel, for the motor vehicles. That is fuel that is easily available even from local towns and so we will reduce the cost of bringing fuel all the way from Nairobi to here,” Wachira said.
The aircraft also has safety features that allow a pilot to deploy a parachute in case of an engine failure.
“So one can come back on the ground safely compared to the normal aircraft whereby one has to look for a field to land reducing chances of coming back to the ground safely,” he said.
Wachira spoke to reporters on Saturday after a visit by various stakeholders in the aviation industry to inspect the airstrip ahead of the inauguration.
The team had earlier met Central regional commissioner Wilfred Nyagwanga to make arrangements for the inauguration.
Flight training center also has branches in Nairobi and Mombasa.
Wachira said they decided to start another training branch in Nyeri because the area has a very good elevation of 5500 feet above sea level .
“It has a long runway and tarmacked and so it is very ideal for training. The other advantage of Nyeri is that it has no congestion compared to Wilson Airport in Nairobi where we have a lot of traffic,” he said.
Lack of traffic allows students to fly many hours in a day.