A witness at the on-going Coroner’s inquest into the Dana Air Crash, Alexander Omaghomi, has said the negligence and failure of the flight crew to adhere to required emergency guidelines led to the tragedy.
Mr Omaghomi also known as Captain Tito said he had more than 32 years’ experience as a Pilot on Thursday told the Coroner, Magistrate Oyetade Komolafe, that his opinion of the preliminary report of the Accident Investigation Bureau (AIB) was that the pilot and his crew failed to keep to necessary checklists to prevent the fatalities of the air crash.
Omaghomi, a pilot with the defunct Nigerian Airways while being led in evidence by Femi Falana, explained that checklists are items and actions you take in the operations of a flying plane.
The former pilot who retired from flying commercial planes in 1993 said his analysis of the AIB report on the Dana Air crash was that the cockpit was a “a disorganised cockpit” and that the plane “became a flight that nobody had controlled.”
According to him, the pilot did not call for help when he should have done, that is at the time when the plane had already lost two engines.
He further stated that the rules are that no pilot flies for more than 100 hours in a month.
He observed that the pilot of the ill-fated plane had put in 120 hours of flight within 14 days. This was illegal, he said.
Omaghomi lamented that there were only 17 accidents between 1965-2003 while there has been almost 21 air mishaps from 2003 till date.
Earlier, an Aviation Operations Manager with Total Nigeria PLC, Daniel Akpokoje had testified that the last time Dana Air bought fuel from his company was November last year.
He stated that before fuel is supplied to an aircraft, several checks are normally made to ensure that there are no sediments or water mixed with it.
The Coroner adjourned hearings till August 13th in consideration for relatives, who are now collecting the remains of their loved ones who died in the crash.
