General Manager, Public Affairs, NCAA, Fan Ndubuoke, who confirmed the suspension, said it was because its flight from Port Harcourt to Lagos made on air return due to technical problem.
It was learnt that the aircraft lost one of its engines and this was the second time in a week that such an incident would happen.
An informed source revealed that the aircraft had flown 38 miles away from Port Harcourt when one of the engines shut down, when it called the control tower.
It was gathered that by the time it was making the air return, it had flown 45 miles with one engine, in an aircraft laden with passengers.
Remember last year, the airline recorded a tragic air accident in Lagos that killed 153 persons on board.
This came as the Accident Investigation and Prevention Bureau (AIB) announced yesterday that it had commenced investigation into the crash of Embraer 120 ER aircraft marked 5N-BJY belonging to Associated Aviation Limited, which occurred at the Joint Users Hydrants (JUHEL) installation at the Murtala Muhammed International Airport (MMIA) Lagos last Thursday.
It was also learnt yesterday that the Ondo State Government had before the crash protested against Associated Aviation Limited flights to the state because of a previous incident which happened during one of the airline's flights to the Akure airport as well as the precarious nature of the airplanes in its fleet.
The state Commissioner for Information, Mr. Kayode Akinmade, told THISDAY that the Governor, Olusegun Mimiko, after a flight in the now crashed aircraft, warned his officials to stop flying the airline's plane, because of the decadent state of the aircraft.
It was further gathered that the governor also requested that the airline should stop flying into the Akure airport, "fearing that it might one day cause the death of people."
Sent from my BlackBerry® wireless handheld from Glo Mobile.
No comments:
Post a Comment