Chinedu Eze
4 November 2009
Lagos — The Nigeria Civil Aviation Authority (NCAA), which is investigating the cause of the near collision of a private jet carrying the Akwa Ibom state governor, Godswill Akpabio and an aircraft owned by Allied Air, off Port Harcourt airport, has ordered for the tapes containing discussions between the pilots of the aircraft and that of the air traffic controllers at the Port Harcourt and Calabar airports.
The Allied Air aircraft, Boeing 727, which was said to have been cleared to land at the Port Harcourt airport would have had head-on collision, mid-air with the private jet, a Hawker 900XP that was flying from Calabar to the same airport and which had to suddenly descend 500 feet to avoid the collision, an action that jolted and frightened the passengers and the crew who missed death by hair's breath.
THISDAY learnt that the regulatory body believes that the content of the tapes would help it unravel the cause of the incident which it said was air miss.
The NCAA, on Monday, held a meeting that lasted for several hours with the Nigerian Airspace Management Agency, the management of the two airlines and four pilots involved in the air miss.
The Director-General, NCAA, Dr. Harold Demuren, said a team had been set up to read the tapes containing the discussions between the pilots and the control towers.
According to him, the team consisted of experts in airworthiness, air traffic control services and navigational communication experts.
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