Air Nigeria To Build Maintenance Facilities

In a bid to reduce the cost of maintaining its aircraft, Air Nigeria plans to build its own maintenance facility.

The managing director of Air Nigeria, Mr. Kinfe Kahssaye, said the facility will reduce the cost borne in maintaining its aircraft overseas as well as inconveniences associated with taking aircraft abroad for major maintenance.

It costs airlines colossal sums of money to fix their aircraft abroad as there is no major hangar in Nigeria for major aircraft maintenance, forcing airlines to take their airplanes to either Europe or Asia.

Also, Arik Airline plans to set up its own facilities in Lagos, Abuja and other parts of the country for the maintenance of its aircraft.

Speaking on other plans by Air Nigeria, Kahssaye said: “Within the framework of the first phase of the turn-around plan, we have stabilized the operation and progressively strengthened our regional and domestic route network base to support our existing hub and spoke model at the Murtala Muhammed Airport, Ikeja, Lagos”.

He noted that with the expected aircraft deliveries, Air Nigeria will further build strong hub and spoke operation in Lagos which will be used as a launching pad to start its long-haul international flights.

According to him, “As part of our fast and profitable growth strategy, we are to introduce modern aircraft consisting of both short and long haul for our international and intercontinental operations”, adding: “From our current fleet of ten aircrafts, we would be operating up to 30 aircrafts within the next three years”.

He noted that in addition to the fleet renewal and expansion plan over the next three years, Air Nigeria plans to build a modern facility to undertake major aircraft maintenance.

Meanwhile, the International Civil Aviation Organisation (ICAO) has rolled out new security measures for the global aviation industry.

The new measures emphasize more extensive screening of Cargo, mail and other goods prior to placing them on board aircraft and better protection from unauthorized interference from the point where security controls are applied until the departure of the aircraft.