FAAN Orders Relocation Of Unused Aircraft From MMIA

The Federal Airports
Authority of Nigeria (FAAN), has ordered airlines operators to relocate unutilised aircraft from Lagos to less traffic airports in the country.
This is in a bid to create space for operating airlines at the Murtala Muhammed International Airport (MMIA), Lagos.
The regional manager of the South-West region of FAAN, Mrs Victoria Shin-Aba, who made the appeal during a tour of the airport facilities recently, explained that the authority was working hard to create enabling environment for the airline operators.
She explained that though FAAN was building aprons at both the international, cargo and domestic terminals to accommodate aircrafts, it is imperative that airlines move their equipment to airports with less traffic at no cost.
“Currently we have 32 international airlines flying into Nigeria and about 272 international aircraft movement daily for both arrival and departure.
“On the domestic scene, we have 27 arrival and 32 departures, while we have 30 cargo arrivals and 28 departures.
“At our cargo apron, the capacity is meant to take four aircraft (i.e two wide bodied aircraft and two small aircrafts) at the same time. Once in a while, we have more than the capacity and once this place is filled up, we take the cargo flights to the international and that is additional cost to the cargo airline, as they need to deploy and truck their goods from international to cargo.
” This is why we need to create space for airlines . Safety issues can also arise due to congestion which is what happens most of the time”, she said.
On what FAAN is doing to create space before the aprons are built, Mrs Sin-Aba said that the authority was reaching out to the airlines, saying it is not all the aircrafts on the apron that are unserviceable.
She, however, noted that some of the owners of the affected aircrafts were expressing fears concerning the security of their machines but added that these are things that can be worked out to aid growth in the industry.

Corlins Walter