Contrary to the belief that most Nigerian airlines fly old aircraft in the nation’s airspace, age of a plane is not to a barrier to its airworthiness, according to experts.Experts are of the opinion that older aircrafts are flying well even in the developed countries by some of the giant airlines in the world.
The likes of Delta, United, Lufthansa and other leading airline operators are flying 20-40 years old airplanes but with good maintenance schedule for those planes as well as the crew, they said.
Basically, what is important in aviation business globally is the non compromise of safety through the observation of continuous maintenance and certification of air planes and qualifications of the operating personnel both the pilots, flight officer, engineers and the cabin crew.
Captain Mohammed Joji, the Secretary General Airline Operators of Nigeria (AON), said there was no correlation between safety and the age of an aircraft, saying a decision to retire an aircraft was basically economic.
He said “an ageing aircraft require more frequent maintenance than new aircraft and that a well maintained old aircraft is better than a poorly maintained new aircraft.”
Similarly, the Chief Executive of Zenith Travel, Olumide Ohunayo, said age of an aircraft was not as important as its maintenance and certification and the cabin crew.
People, according to him, were just making comments out of context with high emotion because of the unfortunate crash.
He said the ill-fated aircraft entered the country’s airspace at the age of 18 in August 2008, adding that the plane in question didn’t crash because of its age contrary to speculations.
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