Louis Ibah
Dana Airlines Limited, on Sunday, announced that it successfully scaled through a recertification and safety audit conducted on its operations by the Nigerian Civil Aviation Authority (NCAA).
The NCAA audit involved a thorough review on the airline’s operation from its ground handling department, to the airworthiness of the aircraft on its fleet, as well as the quality assurance and safety processes deployed by Dana Airlines for its operations.
The NCAA at the audit declared that Dana Airlines operations aligned with international standards and best practices.
Spokesman for Dana Airlines, Mr. Kingsley Ezenwa in a chat with aviation correspondents said the airline was excited that it scaled the recertification exercise, which he noted was very rigorous.
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Ezenwa said the airline having successfully scaled through the NCAA audit, proved that all the negative perceptions created about the safety of the airline’s operations in recent months by some persons were wrong and mischievous.
“We have concluded our re-certification exercise with the NCAA during which the airline’s operation is totally reviewed from ground handling to quality assurance and particularly safety standards and we are glad to have scaled this rigorous process,” said Ezenwa.
“We wish to commend the NCAA for doing a thorough job and for giving us a clean bill of health which on its own should reassure our passengers that our 10 years experience in Nigeria’s airspace is no fluke.
“We are however worried about some orchestrated and baseless stories that were circulated while the exercise lasted. The safety and comfort of our customers comes first before any other consideration and we find such report really unnecessary,” Ezenwa added.
Ezenwa said Dana Air presently has five aircraft in its fleet, but noted that two of these aircraft had been flown outside Nigeria for mandatory maintenance (commonly called C-checks).
He, however, assured that plans had been concluded to acquire more aircraft in the coming year as part of its strategic route and fleet expansion program for 2019.
“At the moment, discussions with our financial partners are in top gear and very soon we will acquire some aircraft to add to our fleet.
“However, we really feel the pain of our passengers who have had to travel by road as a result of the shortage of aircraft across the country and hike in fares and wish to reassure them of our commitment towards putting an end to it in 2019
“In the interim, our smart scheduling team have created additional flights to ensure that individuals, friends and families traveling this yuletide for business or leisure are not stranded or suffer unreasonable hike in fares for poor service,” he added.