Aviation
Turkish Airlines fails again
…lands in Abuja without passengers’ luggage
Barely two weeks after Turkish Airlines was sanctioned by the Nigeria Civil Aviation Authority for failure to airlift luggage of its passengers from Istanbul to Abuja, a logistic blunder that led to security breach at the international wing of the Nnamdi Azikiwe Airport, the airline has repeated the same error.
This time, the airline, according to the Federal Airports Authority of Nigeria (FAAN), has, again, failed to deliver passengers’ luggage todaySaturday, January 9, 2016 in a flight that arrived at 12.35 pm.
The airline’s seeming recalcitrance has become a cause of worry to FAAN, casting doubts on whether it would bend to the existing rules of civil aviation on freighting provided by the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO).
However, the agency’s Managing Director Engr. Saleh Dunoma has advised the airline to resolve the recurrent cases of arriving without passengers’ luggage once and for all.
Dunoma gave the advice at Nnamdi Azikiwe International Airport Abuja, where he expressed the Honourable Minister of Aviation, Alhaji Hadi Sirika’s displeasure to the management of Turkish Airlines.
Dunoma described as unacceptable, this reoccurrence barely two weeks after a similar incident led to a breach of airport security.
He called for quick and lasting resolution of this unwholesome act capable of disrupting the peace and harmony of the airport.
He, however, appealed to passengers to remain calm and law abiding as the authority was making frantic efforts to find a lasting solution and safeguard their rights.
An airline official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity, told National Daily that the Federal Government should sanction the airline heavily because it was not a first offender, as passengers have always experienced delayed or missing luggage on board the airline.
The official stated that this time the embattled airline did not use big aircraft, as the passengers were not much compared to flight TK624.
