NCAA to Travellers: Expect Flight Delays During Yuletide

•Aero resumes operations

Chinedu Eze

The Director General of the Nigerian Civil Aviation Authority (NCAA), Captain Musa Nuhu has urged air travellers to expect flight delays due to Harmattan haze as the yuletide draws nearer.

He, however, commended the nation’s oldest carrier, Aero Contractors, which he said has met all standard conditions to resume operation on December 5, 2022.

Nuhu explained that due to passenger surge during the yuletide, there would be high passenger traffic, noting however that at the same time, harmattan haze disrupts flights, hence the expected delays.

“Flight cancellations can come from many reasons. I am not making excuses for any operator; sometimes, you have technical problem, weather and other disruptions that affect the flight schedules and sometimes, the airlines too, their planning is not the best.

“So, we work with everybody. It is not just the airlines; the airlines are part of the eco-system in the airport. Whenever we have the Yuletide, we are going to have surge in passenger traffic that may be beyond the terminal capacity.

“That one also has an impact on the departure of an airline. Sometimes, the handlers are overloaded because of the loads. It will have an impact on the plan of the airline. So, we are doing our best to mitigate the challenges,” he said.

The Director General explained that Aero Contractors did not have any safety challenges and passed NCAA’s audit and therefore should resume flight operations.

“Aero Contractors was not grounded based on safety issues, we did an audit of them because whatever audit you do, you have findings and they were all minor findings.

“There was no Level 1, 2, 3 findings. They were very insignificant. We notified them. We audited them and we found out that the issue they had was finance sustainability.

“Aviation is safety sensitive and whenever you have financial difficulty, it is just a matter of time, you will not be able to comply with all the regulatory requirements and some may start cutting corners.

“So, before financial issues become safety issue, we had a discussion with them and they on their own before we took any action, agreed with our findings and suspended their operations to enable them reorganise and get some funding to get more equipment. That is what they have done.

“We sat with them, they submitted, we asked for projection, which they did, we reviewed. The first one wasn’t good enough, they had to go and review it and it was quite satisfactory.

“We had MoU with them for payment of outstanding 5 per cent on Ticket Sales Charge (TSC). So, they are fine. As far as we are concerned, they can resume operations,” he said.

 Nuhu also reiterated that Nigeria’s airspace was safe. This, he said was due to the seriousness with which the regulatory agency applies in ensuring compliance to all regulatory requirements.

“We are doing our best to ensure that there is continuous safety in the air and we ensure compliance with all our regulations and recommended practices.

“We work together with the industry to see how we can assist, help the industry, but the truth of the matter is that the outbreak of Covid-19 pandemic did not only put the airlines in a difficult situation, but exposed a lot of fractions within the system.

“A lot of airlines didn’t globally survive the Covid-19 and some are still being affected from the impact of Covid-19.

 “When we thought we were recovering, then we had issues of foreign exchange, Jet A1 (aviation fuel) crisis, which further put the industry in a very difficult situation. They are trying under difficult circumstances and that increased our workload to continue the surveillance to ensure that safety margins are adhered to and we are getting there,” the Director General said.

On the preparation for the high Christmas season, Nuhu said there was always rush for the travelling public in December.

“It is the airlines that will put measures in place and the airport operators and we ensure that proper mitigating measures are put in place to facilitate operations during the Yuletide period, as far as issue of navigation facilities are concerned.

“Calibration has just started to ensure that they are all in top shape so that when the inclement weather comes in, flights can operate with minimum disruption,” he added.