AS the dust was yet to settle over the outbreak of a thick smoke from the cabin of an Aero Contractor PortHarcourt/Lagos bound flight carrying 53 passengers on board Tuesday, the Murtala Muhammed Airport yesterday again recorded incident of the collision of two aircraft on ground.
Early information gathered indicated that two airplanes belonging to Air Peace were involved in the accident.
Trouble started when one of the aircraft, a Boeing 737 with registration number 5NBKR which was taxiing towards the international wing of the airport for a regional flight operation collided with another aircraft of the same airline parked at the apron wing of the airport.
The situation led to the temporary grounding of the two aircraft.
Confirming the development, the management of Air Peace in a statement issued by its media officer declared: “We confirm that at about 6.15am today, (Thursday), the winglet of our B737 aircraft with registration mark 5N-BQR, which was being towed within the very limited space at the ramp of the Murtala Muhammed Airport in Lagos to position for departure, had a partial contact with the stabilizer of another of our B737 aircraft with registration mark 5N-BQP.
“Although, the points of contact of the two aircraft were only slightly impacted, we took the cautious decision to declare them unserviceable to enable proper investigation of the incident, checks and repair by our Engineering and Maintenance Department in line with our high safety standards.
“There were no passengers on the two aircraft involved in the incident. We have also revised our flight schedule to cater to our esteemed guests on the 14 sectors the two aircraft were scheduled to service today. At the moment, everything is working according to plan and our engineers have already begun repair of the aircraft.”
This is just as the Nigerian Civil Aviation Authority (NCAA) has commenced investigation into the incident.
According to the regulatory body, the affected aircraft will remain on ground until they are repaired and certified fit to resume flights again.
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