Govt gets Dana Air crash report
Contaminated aviation fuel raises fresh safety worries
THE Accident Investigation Bureau (AIB) has submitted the preliminary report of its investigation of the June 3, 2012 Dana Air aircraft crash to the Federal Government, a source in the Ministry of Aviation told The Guardian yesterday.
According to the source, the report was submitted last week.
The source added that a more detailed interim report of the crash would be ready in three months.
The source said: “The Dana Air aircraft crash preliminary report has been submitted to the government over a week ago. The preliminary report contained just some basic facts about the crash. The information therein is for government’s consumption. The report was not too detailed. It only gave facts of some things that happened to the ill-fated plane before the crash.
“The interim report, which is more detailed, will be submitted between three and six months, that is some time around September or December, depending on the pace the team investigating the accident can move. The final report will then come later after the interim report. That is the way the three reports will be submitted. The final report is expected to be ready in one year.”
Spokesman, AIB, Mr. Tunji Oketunbi, confirmed that the agency usually submits three reports to the government namely, preliminary, interim and final reports.
However, Oketunbi said he could not confirm if the preliminary report had been submitted to the government and that would not be able to comment on the time lines of the reports.
He said the reports would be ready as soon as the investigators completed their work.
Meanwhile, as part of the on-going investigation of the recent Dana Air mishap, samples of aviation fuel otherwise known as JET A1 taken from some oil marketers (names withheld) for laboratory analysis at the weekend were found to have been heavily contaminated.
The discovery has raised fresh safety fear in the aviation industry, as experts say contaminated fuel could cause an aircraft’s engines to malfunction or even fail completely, causing a crash.
A source, who spoke with The Guardian under condition of anonymity, said airlines in the country might have been flying their aircraft on the contaminated fuel in total ignorance of the fact.
In a related development, the International Air Transport Association (IATA), the clearing house for global airlines, will meet with African heads of state in Abuja next month to adopt the Africa Strategic Improvement Action Plan.
IATA’s Senior Vice President for Safety, Operations and Infrastructure, Gunther Matschnigg, stated this in an interview at the weekend. According to him, the latest safety statistics from the IATA Safety Report 2011, published this year, show a dramatic improvement in the safety performance in Africa last year with total accident rates falling 61 per cent to 6.17 accidents per million departures, sharply down from the 15.68 per million in 2010.
Last year, there was a tripartite meeting among Arik Air, the Nigerian Airspace Management Agency (NAMA) and the Nigeria Civil Aviation Authority (NCAA) during which the airline raised the issue of fuel contamination.
Arik brought the issue before the NCAA and NAMA following allegations of underhand dealings by one oil marketer (name withheld). Specifically, the oil marketer was accused of selling Dual Purpose Kerosene (DPK) to unsuspecting airlines as aviation fuel.
Investigations by the airlines with Lloyd of London, which has the list of oil importers, indicated that the accused oil marketer neither bought nor imported aviation fuel in the 12 months before the allegation was made last year.
The airlines also confirmed that the oil marketer had then been importing DPK at N40.90 a litre, which it in turn sold to airlines as JET A1 at N152 a litre.
The NCAA, after investigating the allegation, ruled out the possibility of airlines running their flying operations on DPK as substitute of JET A1.
And, the Federal Government has been asked to take a holistic look at all aspects of the country’s aviation, with a view to forestalling a repeat of the Dana Air crash in which no fewer than 153 people died.
An aviation consultant, Mr. Segun Salau, who gave the charge in Lagos, also cautioned against politicising the Dana Air crash, which he said was “unfortunate, especially now that the aviation industry is witnessing unprecedented growth.”
THE Accident Investigation Bureau (AIB) has submitted the preliminary report of its investigation of the June 3, 2012 Dana Air aircraft crash to the Federal Government, a source in the Ministry of Aviation told The Guardian yesterday.
According to the source, the report was submitted last week.
The source added that a more detailed interim report of the crash would be ready in three months.
The source said: “The Dana Air aircraft crash preliminary report has been submitted to the government over a week ago. The preliminary report contained just some basic facts about the crash. The information therein is for government’s consumption. The report was not too detailed. It only gave facts of some things that happened to the ill-fated plane before the crash.
“The interim report, which is more detailed, will be submitted between three and six months, that is some time around September or December, depending on the pace the team investigating the accident can move. The final report will then come later after the interim report. That is the way the three reports will be submitted. The final report is expected to be ready in one year.”
Spokesman, AIB, Mr. Tunji Oketunbi, confirmed that the agency usually submits three reports to the government namely, preliminary, interim and final reports.
However, Oketunbi said he could not confirm if the preliminary report had been submitted to the government and that would not be able to comment on the time lines of the reports.
He said the reports would be ready as soon as the investigators completed their work.
Meanwhile, as part of the on-going investigation of the recent Dana Air mishap, samples of aviation fuel otherwise known as JET A1 taken from some oil marketers (names withheld) for laboratory analysis at the weekend were found to have been heavily contaminated.
The discovery has raised fresh safety fear in the aviation industry, as experts say contaminated fuel could cause an aircraft’s engines to malfunction or even fail completely, causing a crash.
A source, who spoke with The Guardian under condition of anonymity, said airlines in the country might have been flying their aircraft on the contaminated fuel in total ignorance of the fact.
In a related development, the International Air Transport Association (IATA), the clearing house for global airlines, will meet with African heads of state in Abuja next month to adopt the Africa Strategic Improvement Action Plan.
IATA’s Senior Vice President for Safety, Operations and Infrastructure, Gunther Matschnigg, stated this in an interview at the weekend. According to him, the latest safety statistics from the IATA Safety Report 2011, published this year, show a dramatic improvement in the safety performance in Africa last year with total accident rates falling 61 per cent to 6.17 accidents per million departures, sharply down from the 15.68 per million in 2010.
Last year, there was a tripartite meeting among Arik Air, the Nigerian Airspace Management Agency (NAMA) and the Nigeria Civil Aviation Authority (NCAA) during which the airline raised the issue of fuel contamination.
Arik brought the issue before the NCAA and NAMA following allegations of underhand dealings by one oil marketer (name withheld). Specifically, the oil marketer was accused of selling Dual Purpose Kerosene (DPK) to unsuspecting airlines as aviation fuel.
Investigations by the airlines with Lloyd of London, which has the list of oil importers, indicated that the accused oil marketer neither bought nor imported aviation fuel in the 12 months before the allegation was made last year.
The airlines also confirmed that the oil marketer had then been importing DPK at N40.90 a litre, which it in turn sold to airlines as JET A1 at N152 a litre.
The NCAA, after investigating the allegation, ruled out the possibility of airlines running their flying operations on DPK as substitute of JET A1.
And, the Federal Government has been asked to take a holistic look at all aspects of the country’s aviation, with a view to forestalling a repeat of the Dana Air crash in which no fewer than 153 people died.
An aviation consultant, Mr. Segun Salau, who gave the charge in Lagos, also cautioned against politicising the Dana Air crash, which he said was “unfortunate, especially now that the aviation industry is witnessing unprecedented growth.”
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