Travel question: What hope is there for my commute to Sierra Leone?

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Air links to the country took a hit after an outbreak of ebola virus (Tim Henshall)

Q I’ve started working in Sierra Leone. Any idea if direct flights from UK are likely to start in the future? Now that KLM has stopped flying to Freetown, there are limited options even with one or two stops. From Birmingham on Air France or Brussels Airlines fares are very high.

Alistair R

A Congratulations on your posting. I have not been lucky enough to visit Sierra Leone, but I have had heard great things about the country.

Unfortunately since the outbreak of ebola virus in Sierra Leone and its neighbours, Guinea and Liberia, air links to the region have drastically reduced.

As a result of the cut in competition, fares have risen.

The best deals are likely to be found on the airline that serves more countries in Africa than any other: Turkish Airlines. You can fly daily non-stop from Birmingham to its Istanbul hub, with onward connections to Freetown three days a week. But it is an extremely long journey: over 5,000 miles, compared with around 3,000 for a (non-existent) non-stop flight from London or Birmingham.

If you break the journey for at least 24 hours in Istanbul, you will reduce your liability for Air Passenger Duty from £78 to just £13, and be better prepared for the second leg – which, at 3,408 miles, is the same as Heathrow to Dubai.

A much more direct option that you may not have considered is Royal Air Maroc from London via Casablanca to Freetown. The Moroccan national airline is efficient, and connections at its Casablanca hub are straightforward.

Services are most frequent from Heathrow, but those from Gatwick – further from the Midlands – are likely to be cheaper, because of lower airport fees.

A final option is to find a cheap holiday flight from the UK (probably Manchester or Gatwick) to Banjul in Gambia. But then you will need to travel overland via Senegal, Guinea-Bissau and Guinea, which could take days and cost a fortune in visa fees.

British Airways may well restart flights to Freetown in due course, but when it does don’t expect any particularly cheap deals. Most of the passengers are working for NGOs or travelling on business, which means that airlines are able to keep fares higher than for routes of comparable lengths.

Every day our travel correspondent Simon Calder tackles a reader’s question. Just email yours to s@hols.tv or tweet @simoncalder