Sigma Airlines to operate Kazakhstan’s first Boeing 747 freighter

Sigma Airlines is to base its Boeing 747-222B(SF) at Chimkent airport in the south of Kazakhstan (Kazakhstan Aviation Administration)

Sigma Airlines, the privately owned Kazakh freight carrier, has added a Boeing 747-200 freighter to its fleet. The aircraft, which was added to Kazakhstan’s civil aircraft register in December, is the first of the type in the country’s commercial aviation industry, Kazakhstan’s Aviation Administration (KAA) has reported.

Sigma Airlines’ Boeing 747-222B(SF) was produced in 1987 (MSN 23737) and was previously operated under tail number N794CK by US cargo airline Kalitta Air. In Kazakhstan the aircraft has reportedly received the registration number UP-B4702 and, according to the Kazakh aviation authority, it will be based at Chimkent, in the south of Kazakhstan.

Sigma Airlines has rented the Boeing 747 from an unnamed UAE airline for a two-year period up to 2022, adding it to its existing four-aircraft fleet of IL-76TDs and an Airbus A300B4F.

According to information from KAA, Sigma Airlines has been operating since January 2017 and was apparently founded at the premises of Air Almaty, which currently has no Air Operator’s Certificate (AOC). Its general manager Umirbek Kenesbayev now runs Sigma Airlines. Air Almaty is reportedly morphed into Sigma Airlines in March 2018.

According to its website, Sigma Airlines flies mostly to destinations in the Middle East, Europe, CIS countries, Africa and South America. In mid-2019 the airline reported that it had delivered consignments of humanitarian aid to Syria. Last year it announced that it had gained a third-country operator’s certificate from EASA, Europe’s aviation safety agency.

Last year Kazakhstan start-up airline IrMa Air Service launched specialist airfreight services using an Ilyushin IL-18 four-engined veteran turboprop.