Minister of Aviation and Aerospace Development, Festus Keyamo, said Monday’s inferno at the old terminal of Murtala Muhammed International Airport (MMIA), Lagos, known as Terminal 1, severely damaged critical equipment for weather management and airspace communication.
Speaking to newsmen after an assessment of the extent of the damage, Keyamo said the terminal, which was already slated for total rehabilitation before the fire, would be pulled down.
During the assessment tour with the minister, THISDAY observed that the fourth floor of the building, where Nigerian Meteorological Agency (NIMET) weather equipment and Nigerian Airspace Management Agency (NAMA) communication equipment were installed, was literally devoured by the fire, with equipment destroyed beyond redemption.
Speaking during the inspection of the charred section of the terminal building, the minister said, “it is not the new terminal that was affected. It is the terminal that we are about to pull down.
“I won’t say fortunately because there is nothing fortunate about fire. So, even though we are trying to pull down this old terminal, there were certain equipment that we also needed to retrieve.”
Keyamo stated that certain persons also needed to leave the old building for the Federal Airports Authority of Nigeria (FAAN) to start work.
He assured Nigerians that even before the fire, FAAN had already made temporary arrangement to move most of the airlines and entities in the affected space to the temporary place provided by China Civil Engineering Construction Company (CCECC).
He said the fire incident had only helped to hasten the airlines’ move away from the building.
He, however, regretted that a lot of equipment were damaged by the fire.
Keyamo stated, “It is still not safe to go to the 5th, the 6th and the 7th floor. Our NIMET equipment and office are totally gone. Our air traffic controllers were trapped up there on Tuesday. Many of them had to be rescued by crane.
“So, some of our equipment are damaged. We just want to thank God that there was no single loss of life. That is the first gratitude we have to God. But work will start in earnest to start clearing the rubbles. And then, of course, it will hasten our process of the reconstruction.”
He said the CCECC engineers were already on site and were only waiting for people to evacuate the building.
The minister also disclosed that airport workers, who were injured by the fire on Monday, and who were hospitalised, were responding to treatment at a health facility in Lagos.
THISDAY also learnt that Air Traffic Controllers had relocated to the Fire Service office of FAAN, along with communication engineers, where they now coordinate their function with their counterparts at the Total Radar Coverage of Nigeria (TRACON) office.
The small tower at the fire station is helping the controllers to fairly see the whole airport for aircraft ground movement, take offs and landings; although with the location of the fire station, the international runway, known as Runway 18R, is not very visible at the fire tower, but with coordination with the controllers at the TRACON facility, they know when international flights land and take off.
The management of NAMA and FAAN, as at the time of filing this report, were yet to conclude on where to locate the mobile tower for efficient service delivery.
The mobile tower is the alternative to the control tower, located at the fire damaged terminal.
The control tower is a key factor in the orderly and rapid aircraft operations and crew management at the airport.
Chinedu Eze
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