Total airport rebuild for Port Vila

PORT VILA – The World Bank says a US$60 million loan to Vanuatu will be used for a much needed overhaul of its entire aviation industry.

This week the Vanuatu government signed a contract with New Zealand company Fulton Hogan to carry out initial urgent repairs to the runway at Bauerfield Airport.

A number of airlines earlier suspended flights to the airport, citing concerns about the runway’s safety.

The repairs will be funded out of a World Bank loan.

The Bank’s Senior Operations Officer, Lasse Melgard, said the intial repairs are part of World Bank facilitating a larger regional aviation programme which is upgrading airports across the Pacific – Tuvalu and Kiribati and Samoa and Tonga and now Vanuatu.

“The World Bank and the government of Vanuatu have agreed on a series of activities that would upgrade, essentially, the international airports in Vanuatu. That includes Bauerfield. It includes Pekoa. It includes Whitegrass international airports.

“The bulk of the work is to rehabilitate the runway at Bauerfield, to look at building a new terminal but it also includes things like reforming the aviation sector, navigational aids, lights, assistance in developing an aviation sector strategy, an airports master plan. So it’s quite a comprehensive programme.”

The World Bank recently sent a technical team to Vanuatu to look at the Bauerfield runway in particular and to speak to aviation officials about the upgrade.

“The team had two core objectives. The first was to expedite in as a quick manner as possible, the repairs of the runway so that the runway can again be used by the international airlines that had suspended operation.

“The second part of the visit was to come to an agreement on the exact design standards to be used for the longer term rehabilitation of the airport.

“The key thing here is that the agreement has now been signed with Fulton Hogan to conduct the emergency repairs of the airport but that is really just a short term fix to keep the airport safe, until such time as the longer term rehabilitation work can commence.

“It’s an actual overhaul of the entire runway. The repairs that are being undertaken right now is emergency work to fix cracking, to remove debris off the runway – but a completely new runway will be put in place as part of the longer term rehabilitation work.

“We will be talking to the government in the weeks ahead about a timeline but we would be hopeful that, that work should start within a six to eight month period.

“We will be talking with the government in the weeks ahead about its priorities, its vision for the aviation sector and that will include, of course, what it intends to do with other airports in the country.

- Dateline Pacific