The Federal Airports Authority of Nigeria (FAAN) has explained why it diverted Kano-bound flights to the Murtala Muhammed Airport (MMA), Lagos last weekend.
A statement by Mr. Abdullahi Yakubu-Funtua, Director, Public Affairs & Consumer Protection, FAAN on Monday, said that the Kano bound flights were to Lagos due to a lack of serviceable airfield lighting at the Mallam Aminu Kano International Airport (MAKIA), Kano.
According to him, on July 15, 2023, at about 1600hrs, the airfield maintenance team of FAAN had observed that the runway lighting would not come on after the scheduled daily maintenance work of replacing old and weak airfield cables with new ones at runway 06/24.
The maintenance team immediately initiated fault-finding procedures along the cable route to identify the problem and restore power to the airfield lighting circuit.
The statement hinted that the team however observed that the entire runway circuit was affected by the incident, leading to the failure of the Runway 06/24 edge light, the taxiway alpha edge light, PAPI and signage.
Yakubu-Funtua stated that as of 1900hrs local time, the fault was yet to be isolated and power supply to the runway could not be restored, thereby leaving the runway in a total blackout, which affected night operations at the airport.
He said that in a bid to ensure continuous flight operations, FAAN had to divert arriving flights to alternate airports across the country, including the Lagos airport.
- The statement added: “At 2300hrs, after all, efforts to restore power supply to the runway failed, Operations Department initiated a Notice TO Airmen (NOTAM) action for the closure of Runway 06/24 between the hours of 2300hrs on 15th July to 07:00hrs of 16th July 2023.
- “The FAAN regrets any inconvenience caused by the diversion of the two Kano bound aircraft to Lagos, due to the unserviceability of the runway lights 06/24.”
Yakubu-Funtua stated that the agency had since resumed night operations at the Kano airport as new cables were installed on Sunday.