NCAA gives Dana Air clean bill to continue flying

Nigeria’s Dana Air has been given a clean bill of health to continue to provide flight services to the traveling public in Nigeria.

The intervention and inspection of the aircraft in the fleet of the airline has put to rest the ongoing allegations that passengers should boycott the carrier over unsubstantiated report of unworthiness.

The clean bill according to information gathered was given after the Nigerian Civil Aviation Authority (NCAA) carried out a full inspection on all the aircraft flying in the fleet of the airline few days ago.

According to sources, the regulatory body decided to investigate the air worthiness standard of the aircraft operating in the airline to verify the ungoing campaign against the airline that passengers should not patronize it.

The campaign which spread across all the social media channels for the greater part of last week was traced to an aggrieved pilot in the airline.

In other not to be caught napping, following the rumour, the NCAA was said to swooped on the airline without notice asking it to suspend its flights to enable them carry out a thorough inspection on all their aircraft to cross check the allegations the aggrieved pilot was laying claims to.

The sudden appearance of the inspectors from the NCAA temporarily caused disruption of the airline’s flights with its passengers getting stranded in some airports.

At the end of the impromptu inspection, the airline was cleared to continue flying rendering the campaigns unfounded.

Commenting on the development, the Managing Director of Afrijet Airlines and one time Assistant Secretary of the Airline Operators of Nigeria (AON), Alhaji Mohammed Tukur condemned the decision of the aggrieved pilot to engage in an act capable of destroying an airline for personal reasons.

He took a swipe at the pilot in question for violating safety rules by choosing not to report whatever he felt he knew to the appropriate agency to act on rather than spread such in the social media.

His words: “Telling people not to fly Dana Air is unfortunate. If you suspect anything why not report to the body responsible for over sighting safety of airlines if you do not have the plan to destroy it. Everyone must do the right thing.” Dana  Air  is one of the six airlines still operating on the country’s domestic scene.

The airline has again attributed its rebranding to its growing membership and increased benefits attached to the tiers of membership – Blue, Silver  and Gold.

According to the Media and Communications Manager of the airline, Kingsley Ezenwa: “We have rebranded our reward program to Dana Miles club as a result of the growing membership and benefits. We are glad that our guests are now realizing the need to go cashless and use more of their miles for upgrade from economy to business class, payment of excess and a lot of other flight and none flight related benefits.”