… Pledges to cooperate with Nigerian investigators
Louis Ibah
Delta Air Lines Thursday apologised to Nigeria Accident Investigation Bureau (AIB) over its crew and management’s failure to notify the government agency of the emergency landing involving its Airbus 330-200 aircraft on Tuesday night.
Recall that an Atlanta-bound Delta Flight 55, which departed Lagos Tuesday night made an emergency air return less than an hour after its take-off from Murtala Muhammed International Airport following a fire incident on one of the Airbus 330-200’s two engines.
The AIB had impounded the aircraft and also barred engineers and crew dispatched by Delta Air Lines from accessing the aircraft until it lodges an official statement and also agrees to cooperate with Nigerian regulatory agencies on the cause of the incident.
Air Safety Investigation Manager for Delta Air Lines, Miss Shannon Masters, who led the airline’s officials including the crew of the flight and the airline’s Lagos Airport station Manager to the Ikeja head office of AIB around 5pm local time yesterday apologised for the airline’s actions, explaining that it was an oversight and not an intentional act done to undermine the Nigerian agency and the country’s civil aviation laws.
“We sincerely apologise for the error and we promise to cooperate with AIB in the investigation of this incident.”
The Commissioner/CEO of AIB, Akin Olateru, while accepting Delta Air Lines’ apology, said AIB had already commenced investigation into the incident and welcome the airline’s cooperation.
“We look forward to receiving cooperation from Delta Air Lines as we work to determine the cause of this serious incident in the interest of safety,” said Olateru.
The airline was believed to have immediately notified the United States National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) of the occurrence in line with the US laws while refusing to have dealings with any of Nigeria’s regulatory agencies in charge of aircraft accidents and investigations.
Both NCAA and AIB had frowned at the attitude of the US carrier, pointing out that Nigeria, as the state of occurrence under the International Civil Aviation Organisation (ICAO) Annex 13, ought to be officially informed of such occurrences within its airspace by Delta Air Lines.
Under ICAO laws, Nigeria has the right to investigate the incident while the state of registry of the aircraft and the airline may serve as observers, AIB had insisted.