Over 250 passengers evacuated as First Nation hit parked plane at MMA2

Reminiscent of what happened last week when Emirates Airlines B777-200 airplane hit a parked HAK Air’s B737- 400 plan, the wing of a First Nation A320 aircraft hit another on the apron at the Murtala Muhammed Airport 2 (MMA2) yesterday. Saturday Telegraph learnt that the incident which occurred about 3pm yesterday was caused by an air marshaller who made a mistake by clearing the airplane out of the apron without proper observation that the aircraft’s wings were longer for the area it parked. Aircraft marshalling is visual signalling between ground personnel and pilots in an airport, aircraft carrier or helipad.

At airports, the marshaller signals the pilot to keep turning, slow down, stop, and shut down engines, leading the aircraft to its parking stand or to the runway. On aircraft carriers or helipads, marshallers give take-off and landing clearances to aircraft and helicopters, where the very limited space and time between take-offs and landings makes radio communications a difficult alternative.

The managing director of First Nation Airlines, Kayode Odukoya, confirmed the incident. This type of incident is becoming a somewhat regular occurrence on Nigeria’s airports, leading to disruption of flight operations and huge cost on operators, even though that they are insured. According to a source, one of the aircraft involved in the incident was taxiing from the runway to Murtala Muhammed Airport Two, MMA2, to disembark passengers while the other aircraft was preparing to take off to Port Harcourt Airport from the same terminal.

The source close to the scene of the accident confided in our correspondent that the Port Harcourt bound aircraft was parked on Gate 4, while the arriving aircraft was directed to Gate 3 of the terminal. Meanwhile, the Nigerian Civil Aviation Authority (NCAA) has confirmed the incident involving two aircraft between First Nation’s aircraft at the MMA2 in Lagos.

According to Mr. Fan Ndubuoke, general manager in charge of public affairs at NCAA, the incident occurred yesterday when a First Nation aircraft taxing to take off to Port Harcourt hit another stationed first nation aircraft at MM2 According to Ndubuoke, no passenger was hurt and their fare refunded to them while NCAA referred the incident to the Accident Investigation Bureau (AIB).