First Plane In 2 Years Lands At Khartoum Airport, Sudan 🇸🇩: Wow

Konrad Tillman
a few seconds ago
3 min read

Intro

As I was sitting on the toilet in the Polaris Lounge in Newark earlier this morning, I was scrolling instagram and came across something fascinating. For the first time in 2 years, a plane has landed at Khartoum airport in Sudan. Now, this is a huge deal for the country, and resembles a lot more than just a plane...

This story is from about a month ago, FYI, but has not been widely covered.

The Backstory

Over the past few years, we have seen a brutal civil war across Sudan take place, which in turn has led to one of the worst humanitarian crises we have seen in recent times. I'm not going to discuss too much, as this is about travel, but there is the RSF and the SAF fighting for control of the country.

A couple of months into 2023, we saw the RSF take the capital at the time, Khartoum, which led to the closure of the airport due to damage sustained on the runway, and it was an active warzone.

Approximately 2 years later, we saw the SAF, which had moved the "capital" to Port Sudan, regain control of Khartoum, but the airport remained inactive.

What's The Story?

On July 19th, 2025, news spread across Sudan when General Abdel Fattah al-Burhan landed in Khartoum on board his private jet. While the general had previously visited Khartoum via helicopter, this was the first time in over 2 years that a fixed-wing aircraft had landed in Khartoum.

So why is this such a big deal, and why am I covering this? A few different reasons:

Firstly, it's incredible to see the progress (put politics aside here) that has been made on this runway. If you think about the state of the runway 23 months ago, there would never have been the ability to land an aircraft on this runway.
Secondly, and most importantly, I did a little bit of digging into this, and this is just the first step. Apparently, the runway is about "85% fixed", but the passenger terminal is in need of a desperate rebuild. Supposedly, the aim is to have commercial flights up and running by the end of 2025, but I would be skeptical of that coming to fruition.
Now, I wouldn't recommend getting your hopes up about going to Sudan just yet, but this is a step in the right direction for adventure tourists seeking to visit this country. There are few places in the world that are no-go zones, and Sudan is one of them (this is coming from someone who goes to Yemen, Somalia, Libya, etc)

I had the most lovely time in South Sudan recently, and I cannot wait to visit Sudan at some point.

Final Thoughts

For the first time in two years, a plane had landed at Khartoum airport. While this might sound like a small deal on paper, this represents a much larger shift about the future for Sudan. With the runway being 85% fixed, the SAF, which now controls Khartoum, is attempting to get commercial flights up and running by the end of 2025. Don't get your hopes up, though.

I write these sorts of posts, even though they bring in 0 traffic (not that I mind), because I genuinely find "lesser-visited" countries so fascinating. It's hard not to talk politics here, but I really hope we can all leave politics out of this and appreciate that, hopefully, one day, peace can come to the people of Sudan. ❤️