National Airways Corporation buys stake in SkyConnect Leasing

NAC has bought a stake in SkyConnect Leasing, which is deploying eight Black Hawks on European firefighting missions.

National Airways Corporation, the aviation services company based at Lanseria Airport, Johannesburg, has acquired a stake in SkyConnect Leasing, Dublin-registered helicopter leasing company based in Prague, Czech Republic.

The privately-owned South African group acquired an undisclosed stake in the business to “future-proof itself through diversification”, according to the firm.

SkyConnect Leasing has developed a dedicated Black Hawk leasing platform focused exclusively on the aerial firefighting and mission-response sector. For the 2026 fire season, it is deploying eight Sikorsky UH-60 variant Black Hawk helicopters in southern and central Europe. The assets have been assigned to operators on contracts spanning several years, it is understood.

The business is not a generic financing programme adapted to firefighting, highlights the lessor. “It is a structured leasing framework built around the operational intensity, seasonal utilisation cycles, and government-backed contract structures that define wildfire suppression operations,” according to a statement on the lessor’s website.

“We recognise that aerial firefighting differs fundamentally from conventional commercial aviation,” it said. “Revenue visibility is often contract-driven, fleet demand peaks during defined seasonal windows, and aircraft must maintain high technical readiness under sustained daily sortie rates. Our Black Hawk platform is engineered to align capital structures with these operational realities.”

National Airways Corporation is understood to have made the investment as part of its growth and diversification plans. Established in 1946, the business includes fixed- and rotary-wing divisions. It’s helicopter division spans sales, operations, maintenance, the supply of parts and pilot training.

The company has not disclosed the size of the shareholding, whether it delivers a controlling or minority interest or the purchase price. But the acquisition does help the business diversify into helicopter operating leases, specialised public-sector aviation and mission-critical aviation services, such as European wildfire response, rather than traditional commercial aviation.

Its investment comes at a time when the European wildfire season is growing longer and governments are looking to source dedicated aerial firefighting capacity.