The Nigerian Civil Aviation Authority (NCAA) has blamed the perennial
flight delays and cancellations on poor use of capacity across the
domestic routes. The apex regulatory body urged the carriers to always
allow room for exigencies in aircraft deployment and daily operations
to mitigate the worrisome trend.
The Consumer Protection Directorate (CPD) of the NCAA reported that at
least 3,049 flights were delayed in October 2019, with the bulk of the
delays coming from domestic operations. A total of 16,426 flights were
delayed in the first half of 2019, out the 30,043 flights executed by
the airlines.
Industry statistics had earlier shown that a total of 19,323 delays
were recorded in the first half of 2018. Local airlines posted 16,880
delays while their foreign counterparts accounted for 2,443 during the
period. The acting Director General of the NCAA, Capt. Abdullahi Sidi,
said the trend was unacceptable, and the domestic carriers especially,
must begin to take proactive and realistic measures to tackle the
delays.
He observed that most operators often put all their aircraft into
service at once, to get the highest returns. But all the plans easily
get scuttled when one of the operating aircraft goes out of service.
“If you look at what is happening in this country, there are more
airlines compared to 2015. But we have our own challenges. For
instance, an airline has four aircraft, and schedules these four
aircraft to operate toe to toe for maximum effect. Passengers have
booked tickets and waiting to depart. All of a sudden, one out of
those four aircraft develops a fault. It is going to affect the entire
schedule. That is what is happening that we are having such delays.
“In Nigeria, it is a fact that we have some challenges with planning.
I don’t know how the operators are going to feel about this.
Sometimes, they (operators) are selfish. Why put four airplanes to
maxim operation when anything can go wrong? Why not have a backup plan
in place to alleviate the sufferings of the passengers?” he advised.
Besides the local airlines’ use of capacity, Sidi added that the
growth of air passenger traffic, creation of more airlines,
insufficient fleet capacity among operators, poor weather and
inadequate ground equipment at most of the airports are factors behind
flight delays.
“We have issue of bad weather. There are two types: the harmattan and
rainy season. We are now taking care of harmattan that we are already
entering. The approach equipment has been upgraded seriously to even
allow airplane to land in zero weather condition. We have category III
Instrument Landing System (ILS). We have this in Lagos and Abuja.
Other airports are Category II ILS. The only one you can’t do anything
about is heavy rain.
“But, thank God, most heavy rains in tropical zones don’t last for
more than 45 minutes. So, you have to wait to get the weather report
to depart to your destination. Delays will happen when they have to
happen,” he said. Operator and chairman of Air Peace airline, Allen
Onyema, recently said the passengers must as well understand the
peculiarity of the environment and sensitivity of the business. Onyema
explained that with the problems of weather, there is a lot of
rationing to accommodate the sunset airports.
“The airport infrastructure is also not helpful. The government is
just trying to do something about it and until they finish, we would
keep having the challenges. “We have to prioritise our schedules to
accommodate those sunset airports that close by 6pm. So, you see us
trying to do Owerri, Benin, Yola and other sunset airports during the
day. When you do that, Abuja, Lagos, Port Harcourt are sacrificed, and
flown into at night. But passengers don’t understand this. If airports
have night flying facilities, you will see the delays minimised,” he
said.
