Nigeria's worst air disaster in almost 40 years killed
at least 163 people when a Dana Airlines Ltd. passenger plane slammed
into a heavily populated suburb in Nigeria's biggest city, Lagos.
The plane, a Boeing Co. MD-83 with 146 passengers and
seven crew members on board, crashed into the Agege suburb as it was
preparing to land at Murtala Muhammed Airport on a flight from Abuja,
the capital. There were no survivors, Lagos police spokesman Joseph
Jaiyeoba said. A least 10 people on the ground were killed, state-owned
Radio Nigeria reported. The pilot was a U.S. citizen, Cable News Network
said, citing the airline's director of operations.
"At about 3:43 p.m. local time, Dana Flight 0992 from
Abuja to Lagos declared an emergency, a call for May Day to the Lagos
control tower, from about 11 nautical miles," Aviation Minister Stella
Oduah said today on state-owned NTA television. "A minute later the
aircraft disappeared from the air traffic control radar."
Investigators from the U.S. National Transportation
Safety Board are helping the Nigerian Civil Aviation Authority to
investigate the cause of the crash, Dana said today in a statement on
its website.
It was the fourth crash in the past decade in Africa's
top oil producer that claimed the lives of more than 100 people and the
worst since Jan. 22, 1973, when a passenger plane carrying 176
passengers and crew went down in the northern city of Kano, killing all
on board.
President Goodluck Jonathan yesterday declared three
days of national mourning and ordered a full investigation, according to
an e-mailed statement from his office.
Emergency Landing
"We understand according to unconfirmed reports the
pilots were one American national and one Indian national, and we're
working to confirm the information," Bill Strassberger, a spokesman for
the U.S. Embassy, said by phone from Abuja.
The aircraft was forced to carry out an emergency
landing in Lagos on April 20, 2010, after it hit a bird on takeoff,
according to the Flight Safety Foundation's Aviation Safety Network
database. It also experienced emergencies, including electrical smoke in
the cabin, in 2002 and 2006.
The plane, built in 1990, was delivered to Dana in
February 2009, according to the Aviation Safety Network database. It was
previously operated by Alaska Airlines.
Dana Airlines canceled its flights today, according to a statement on its website.
Crash Site
At the crash site, hundreds of onlookers helped the
emergency services deliver water to douse fires while others stood on
pieces of the smouldering aircraft.
"There are crowds all over the place and it's a bit
chaotic," Tunji Oketunbi, a spokesman for the Nigerian Aviation
Ministry's Accident Investigation Bureau, said yesterday.
Lagos state Governor Babatunde Fashola asked residents
of the area to stay away from the crash site to allow the rescue
services to work, and warned of dangerous levels of carbon monoxide.
The airline, owned by Dana Group, has been operating
since November 2008 in Nigeria, Africa's most populous nation. The
carrier runs 27 flights a day, according to a company press statement in
December. Tony Usidamen, a spokesman for Dana Group, didn't answer five
calls made to his mobile phone seeking comment.
Boeing Condolences
Boeing released a statement extending "profound
condolences to the family and friends of those lost in the Dana Airlines
crash" and said the Chicago-based company "stands ready to provide
technical assistance" in the investigation.
Levi Ajuonuma, a spokesman for the state-owned oil company Nigerian National Petroleum Corp., was on the flight.
Africa had the highest airline accident rate in the
world in 2010, accounting for 17 percent of cases, even though it has
the world's lowest traffic rate, with only 3 percent of the population
traveling by plane, according to the Montreal-based International Civil
Aviation Organization.
In Nigeria, 12.5 million passengers flew on domestic
and international carriers in 2009, according to the Federal Airports
Authority of Nigeria.
--With assistance from Dulue Mbachu and Maram Mazen in Abuja and
Andres R. Martinez in Johannesburg. Editors: Karl Maier, Dulue Mbachu
