Days after the suspension of the United Nigeria Airlines’ license by the Nigeria Civil Aviation Authority (NCAA), fresh facts have emerged on the controversy surrounding the embattled air company’s flight diversion incident.
The Flight Dispatcher Association of Nigeria, FLIDAN, has defended itself, saying they did no wrong as they followed the Nigeria Civil Aviation Regulations, Part 8-Operations, by filing a flight plan with the Aeronautical Information Service, AIS.
The flight diversion had occurred last Sunday, involving a United Nigeria Airlines, UNA, Flight NUA 0504 departing Lagos for Abuja, in which it was reported to have landed in Asaba Airport, Delta State.
The Association’s Secretary General, Victoria Adegbe, in a statement said the Aircraft first departed Lagos for Abuja and first alternates was between Enugu and Port Harcourt, which the time of flight departure was 13:00, with the total duration of 55 minutes.
The statement revealed that, the weather folder given had showed Abuja weather is cleared for flight after the Pilot called the Air Traffic Control Tower (ATC) for clearance to depart Asaba and was granted the request against the legal flight plan submitted by the Flight Dispatcher.
FLIDAN further explained that Both the pilot and the ATC appear to ignore what was filed by disregarding “operational control” of the flight dispatcher which empowers a 50% joint and equal responsibility for the safety of the Flight to the flight dispatcher.
The statement concluded that the Association had carried out an in-house investigation on the Flight dispatcher who was on duty and was part of those suspended, upheld his full responsibilities for the dispatch release inline with the Nigerian Civil Aviation regulations, NCAR part 8.
The Association however called on the NCAA to thoroughly investigate the Operations Control of the Airline which seized operational control from the Flight dispatcher on the day of the incident by allowing a Pilot to generate his own Operational Flight Plan (OFP), and taking full responsibility for the dispatch release which results to breaching the existing laws.
The Airline through a statement had blamed the incident on bad weather, a claim that did not align with the Nigerian Airspace Management Agency, NAMA report.
Editor: Ken Eseni
