The Management of the Lagos State University Teaching Hospital, LASUTH has released a list of 29 victims of the Dana Air crash that have been identified by their relatives.
Some of the identified bodies include:
Martin Alade (M), Prof C.O. Onwuluri, Temitope Ariyibi (F),
Sonny Ehioghae (M), Nagidi Ibrahim (M), Chinwe Uzoamaka Obi (F),
Okocha Christopher (M) Mahmud Ahmed Dukawa (M), Anibaba Tosin (F),
Stanford Obstrute (M), Ibrahim Jangana (M),
Ikpoki Obiola (M), Ailende Ehi Joel (M),
Patrick Eze Okonji (M), Kim Edger Norris (M),
Bassey Eyo (M), John Ahmadu Hamza (D.I.G)(M),
Kanguyi (Chinese (M)), Femi Shobowale (M),
Charles Ntoko (M), George Moses (M),
Dr Abiodun Jonathan (M), Obinna Akubueze (M)
Ifeanwaka Jones (M) Olabinjo Awodogbin (M),
Obot Emmanuel (M),
However, 14 out of the 43 bodies at the hospital’s mortuary were yet to be identified by their relatives.
The family members were given forms to fill for identification process which also included taking passport photographs of family representatives and photocopies of their international passports.
Yet, relations of victims who thronged the hospital’s mortuary for collection of the corpses may not be able to claim them until autopsy is carried out according to Lagos State Coroner Law.
As the clamour to take away identified corpses continued, the Chief Medical Director (CMD), LASUTH, Prof Wale Oke, appealed to the aggrieved relations, saying “already we have started doing the autopsy today (Tuesday), and we are going to do at least 12 autopsies per day”.
“Every corpse leaving our mortuaries will leave with a death certificate. And we cannot issue death certificates without autopsy,” he explained.
The CMD affirmed to journalists that “in the next three days, all identified corpses must have been handed over to their families. Our team of pathologists have started work today. We are being careful not to hand over a corpse to the wrong family” he stated.
The Consultant Pathologist and Forensic Medicine and Vice Chancellor, Lagos State University (LASU), Professor John Obafunwa, led seven other pathologists to commence the autopsy.
For many of the relations of the victims, the waiting game to collect their relations corpses has turned into outrage as they openly expressed their displeasure, compounded by the sudden grief.
Earlier in the day, those who have not identified the corpses of their loved ones were anxious to do so, as two family members of the deceased were allowed into the morgue at a time to identify the corpses of their late family members.
Mr Izu Okafor, brother of a victim who died while sleeping in his bedroom in one of the buildings the plane crashed into, late Nwabuwa Okafor, lamented the delay in taking away his brother’s corpse. ”I came on Monday to see my brother’s corpse, but couldn’t, I was told today by 2pm, I am still waiting,” he said.
Power stench
Meanwhile, stench from the morgue grew worse by the day as the 158 bodies recovered from the Dana Flight 0992 crash site has been deposited at the morgue, which already had a number of corpses before the plane crash.
The stench was evident as family members that throng the mortuary had to buy nose mask to prevent inhaling the stench that comes out of the overwhelmed morgue.
Prof Oke had earlier lamented on the capacity of the morgue when he told journalists that “we have 43 dead bodies from the plane crash inside the mortuary plus the bodies that were there before. I don’t think this mortuary has been stretched like this before.”