Qualla: Mbuji Mayi Airport https://qualla.com/mbuji-mayi-airport en-us © 2026 Bendyline Mon, 20 Jul 2026 10:21:26 GMT Qualla serial false Qualla support@bendyline.com yes https://qualla.com/_m/k/w/b/v/mbuji-mayi-airport-wp/hero-small.webp Qualla: Mbuji Mayi Airport https://qualla.com/mbuji-mayi-airport Mbuji Mayi Airport: Introduction https://qualla.com/mbuji-mayi-airport/ Photo credit MONUSCO/Myriam Asmani, CC BY-SA 2.0. On December 24, 2015, a Services Air Cargo Airbus A310 came down at Mbuji Mayi Airport in heavy rain and could not stop. The runway surface was poor and wet; the plane exited the runway. Eight people died - all of them on the ground. Nine more were injured. No crew or passengers were counted among the casualties, because the victims were people who lived or worked near the airport perimeter, caught in the path of an aircraft that ran out of pavement. An accident report names what happened on the runway. What it does not say is why Mbuji Mayi's runway was in such shape at the main airport for one of the world's great diamond cities.

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Image: MONUSCO/Myriam Asmani | CC BY-SA 2.0

]]> Thu, 23 Apr 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/k/w/b/v/mbuji-mayi-airport-wp/kwbv-mbuji-mayi-airport-intro.mp3 0:06 1 full Mbuji Mayi Airport: The Airport and Its City https://qualla.com/mbuji-mayi-airport/ Photo credit MONUSCO/Myriam Asmani, CC BY-SA 2.0. Mbuji Mayi International Airport - in French, Aeroport international de Mbuji-Mayi - serves the city of Mbuji Mayi, the capital of Kasai-Oriental Province in the central Democratic Republic of the Congo. Its ICAO code is FZWA; its IATA code is MJM. The airport's navigational aids...

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Image: MONUSCO/Myriam Asmani | CC BY-SA 2.0

]]> Thu, 23 Apr 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/k/w/b/v/mbuji-mayi-airport-wp/kwbv-mbuji-mayi-airport-the-airport-and-its-city.mp3 0:06 2 full Mbuji Mayi Airport: A History of Diamonds and Labor https://qualla.com/mbuji-mayi-airport/ Photo credit MONUSCO/Myriam Asmani, CC BY-SA 2.0. The diamonds did not arrive peacefully into global markets. For a century, the Kasai fields were worked by Belgian colonial firms, by the successor company Miniere de Bakwanga (MIBA) after independence, and by thousands upon thousands of small-scale miners - many of them children...

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Image: MONUSCO/Myriam Asmani | CC BY-SA 2.0

]]> Thu, 23 Apr 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/k/w/b/v/mbuji-mayi-airport-wp/kwbv-mbuji-mayi-airport-a-history-of-diamonds-and-labor.mp3 0:06 3 full Mbuji Mayi Airport: The 2015 Accidents https://qualla.com/mbuji-mayi-airport/ Photo credit MONUSCO/Myriam Asmani, CC BY-SA 2.0. August 19, 2015: a Brussels Airlines Boeing 737 operating for Korongo Airlines landed at Mbuji Mayi and sustained damage to its horizontal stabilizer when dislodged runway pavement struck the aircraft. No one was injured, but the airframe was damaged. The pavement had come up off...

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]]> Thu, 23 Apr 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/k/w/b/v/mbuji-mayi-airport-wp/kwbv-mbuji-mayi-airport-the-2015-accidents.mp3 0:06 4 full Mbuji Mayi Airport: The Runway and the Rain https://qualla.com/mbuji-mayi-airport/ Photo credit MONUSCO/Myriam Asmani, CC BY-SA 2.0. Runways are more specialized than they look. The asphalt or concrete surface must flex slightly under heavy loads without cracking, shed water quickly so that braking aircraft do not aquaplane, resist rutting from the tonnage of passing landings, and survive the central African c...

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Image: MONUSCO/Myriam Asmani | CC BY-SA 2.0

]]> Thu, 23 Apr 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/k/w/b/v/mbuji-mayi-airport-wp/kwbv-mbuji-mayi-airport-the-runway-and-the-rain.mp3 0:06 5 full Mbuji Mayi Airport: What the Airport Means https://qualla.com/mbuji-mayi-airport/ Photo credit MONUSCO/Myriam Asmani, CC BY-SA 2.0. Mbuji Mayi Airport is not just a runway. It is the practical link between a city of millions and the rest of the country - a lifeline for medical supplies, for commerce beyond diamonds, for people who need to reach Kinshasa for government business, family reasons, or medical care...

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]]> Thu, 23 Apr 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/k/w/b/v/mbuji-mayi-airport-wp/kwbv-mbuji-mayi-airport-what-the-airport-means.mp3 0:06 6 full