A United Nigeria Airline flight NUA0504, operating from the
Murtala Muhammed Airport in Lagos en route to Abuja, landed at Asaba
International Airport in Delta State.
The development, shocking to passengers, was said to be due
to poor destination weather in the nation’s capital.
But, aviation experts nullified this claim, saying that
weather reports are released to pilots or airlines every 30 minutes.
The airline maintained that at all material time, the
aircraft’s pilot was aware of the temporary diversion and was properly briefed.
However, a report emerged that all the wet lease aircraft
under United Nigeria Airlines have been suspended.
It was gathered that immediately the incident gained
traction on social media on Sunday, the Director-General of Civil Aviation
(DGCA), Capt. Musa Nuhu called an emergency meeting of the agency, where it was
resolved that the excuse given by the airline was not tenable to the authority.
A former Director General of the Agency, Benedict Adeyileka
also confirmed the development shortly after the Minister of Aviation and
Aerospace Development, Festus Keyamo, called upon the heads of aviation
regulatory bodies to address safety issues within the sector.
“I just confirmed that their sub-Part G of their AOC is
suspended. This means all their foreign registered aircraft are on subpart G,”
he told journalists.
“If you take the flight from Lagos to Abuja, the Captain is
supposed to announce that it is landing in Asaba for whatever reason, but that
was not the case.
“The director of the NCAA has the power to suspend that
operation pending the investigation on the matter”.
According to the source, all the wet-leased aircraft in the
airline’s operations would remain suspended pending the outcome of an
investigation on the Sunday incident, involving one of the wet-leased aircraft
in the airline’s fleet.
No fewer than two wet-leased Airbus A320-200 aircraft are in
the fleet of United Nigeria Airlines.