One of the Nigerian Presidential jet, Agusta AW 101, a
medium-lift helicopter which was recently handed over to the Nigerian Air
Force, specially designed for military operations, has crashed at the Nigerian
Air Force base, Makurdi.
The crash is coming two months after President Muhammadu Buhari
handed over two over the two ballistics defence capable aircraft from the
Presidential fleet to the Nigerian Air Force.
According to a report by TheNewGuru.com, the jet
crashed due to poor training of crew members saddled to man the operations of
the aircraft.
After the handover, the aircraft was repainted from the initial
white and green to camouflage.
A source told the news website that damages to the jet were
significant but no life was lost to the crash.
“No fatality but significant damage to aircraft considering the
fact that they hardly do insurance in the military. The flight engineer
was injured.”
The aircraft, Agusta AW101, which is a large armoured helicopter
cost about $21million each (N10.5billion) making it 130% more expensive than
the average aircraft of its class.
But the Nigerian Air Force, PRO, Group Captain Dele Famuyiwa,
has denied the report that one of the aircraft crashed.
“It was not a crash. I wouldn’t call it a crash because it just
fell on the ground in Makurdi.”
“I can say maybe it was
an incident. You know accident is a higher degree of incidence. It was just an
occurrence that did not take any life or equipment. Cars can malfunction and
the same thing with any machine.”
He said the crash was not as a result of low training and skill
of crew member noting that the same crew had managed the aircraft at the
presidency.
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