Ethiopian Airlines has been honored as among the World’s Top 25 Airlines, when measured by Net Profit, in a report published by Air Transport World (ATW) magazine. According to the latest data available for Ethiopia’s flag carrier, the airliner made a net profit of $127.7 million, making it Africa’s most profitable airline and 16th most profitable in the world.

The World’s most profitable airline is Dubai based, Emirates, which made a whopping $963.5 million in net profit. Based on operating revenue, the world’s largest airline is Lufthansa Group with a total revenue of more than $31 Billion followed by Air France KLM and Delta Airlines.

Delta is the World’s largest airline by the number of passengers transported, followed by Southwest and American Airlines.

Ethiopian airlines transported nearly 3 million passengers, an increase of 6.3% from prior fiscal year. Its profit for the fiscal year ended June 30, 2009 was a 165% increase over the prior year’s figure.

Ethiopian airlines operates 26 jet aircraft (including a freighter fleet of two 747Fs, two MD-11Fs and two 757-200Fs) and nine turboprops. It will take delivery of the first of five Boeing 777-200LRs it has on order in the second half of this year. It also will receive three new Boeing 737-800s by year end. Delivery of the first of 10 Boeing 787s on order is scheduled for July 2011. It also ordered 12 A350s last summer, set to begin delivering in 2016.

Ethiopian operates an extensive network, including 14 weekly flights to both China and India. Ethiopian CEO Girma Wake expects passenger traffic to grow at the rate of 20% annually.

Tragedy struck in January when an ET 737-800 crashed into the Mediterranean Sea shortly after takeoff from Beirut, killing all 90 passengers and crew. Flight 409 was en route to Addis Ababa and was carrying mostly Lebanese and Ethiopian passengers.

ANL