We were forced to fly the faulty plane - Dana official ...Pilot alerted airport 7 miles before crash

An official of Dana
Airlines who does
not want to be
named has just
confirmed to
Channels Television

that the ill-fated Dana Air flight
0992, MC Donnell Douglas (MD 83)
was faulty shortly after it left
Lagos and stopped over in
Calabar.
Also, the Special Adviser,
Technical to Minister of Aviation,
Mr. Victor Oche Elias, has
revealed that the pilot of the ill-
fated plane, had alerted the
aviation authority of the
airport, on the emergency
situation 11 nautical miles to
landing.
It was further disclosed that the
pilot’s May-Day cry was given
priority, but the plane could not
make it, as it crashed 4 nautical
miles to landing.
The Dana official alleged that the
Indian owners of the airline
threw caution to the wind and
insisted that the plane must fly
in a bid to maximise profit,
thereby sending the plane over
to Abuja to pick passengers,
when it should have being
returned to Lagos for further
repair.
She also claimed the flight has
had persistent history of faults
with its hydraulics in recent
times and it was not supposed
to have flown.
According to the official, “the
plane has being giving faults for
a very long time. There was a
case when it was on ground in
Uyo for over six hours, because
of delayed flight, it had a bolt.
And then in Abuja it happened a
few days ago, then some people
went with the aircraft but they
could not come back, because it
had a fault there and it couldn't
leave Abuja.”
“The same engineers that fixed
it and then they sent crew to
bring it with passengers to
Lagos.”
Confirming that the plane that
crashed on Sunday, was not
supposed to leave Lagos at all,
the Dana official stated that
“yesterday, it (Dana Air flight
0992) was not supposed to
leave Lagos at all, but it left and
then got to Calabar, gave fault
and it was fixed and then they
took it to Abuja, when they
should have returned to Lagos
but because they didn’t want to
part with the little money they
will make, they took it to Abuja,
loaded full passengers, and then
it couldn't get to Lagos. ”
“It has being having faults over
time, continuously, hydraulics or
one thing or the other. That
aircraft kept having problems
and they were not ready to
park it” she alleged.
She added that the management
of the airline does not return
aircraft with faults back to the
station, as it should have, but
“they make it complete its
normal route to where ever it is
supposed to go before they
bring it back to Lagos” she said.
MC Donnell Douglas MD 83 was
sold to Dana Airline in 2009 by a
US-based Alaska Airlines, ahead
of the airline commencing its
services in Nigeria.
Culled from Channelstv.com

Source: Dailytrust Newspaper