Smoke damage is visible in the departures area of JNIA. A luggage room was hardest hit in the blaze on Thursday night. Photo contributed: Sophie Tremblay
A room containing passenger luggage hardest hit in the fire at Julius Nyerere International Airport (JNIA) on Thursday night.
“All luggage in the room was gutted,” says Works, Transportation and Communications Minister Makame Mbarawa.
The cause of the fire at terminal 2 is still undetermined and a team of investigators are already at work , says Mbarawa, speaking to The Citizen.
Departing passengers had to use the old terminal 1 for most of Friday morning; by Friday afternoon terminal 2 had resumed operations, despite ongoing power problems and passengers reporting a smell of smoke lingering.
As of Saturday afternoon (January 14), very few computers were working and immigration services were being handled manually.
No serious injuries were reported.
Editor’s note: paragraph 4 updated at 17:20 on January 14, to include details about smoke smell.
