The proven fact that rescue mission for the victims of the Igbokoda NAF plane crash took hours to be initiated factors to the failure of emergency response. For each air accident, we should perceive that the catastrophe is avoidable and wouldn’t have occurred if the proper issues had been put in place. Unfortunately, the nation’s strategy to aviation security has all the time been reactive, thereby making the Igbokoda catastrophe a well-known, ugly actuality. In truth, it means that the nation has not learnt something from the same Ejigbo crash of 1992 which claimed greater than hundred lives.
Reports after the catastrophe paint a well-known image of complacency. It is being reported that the plane was grounded in Germany for 3 years all within the title of upkeep earlier than it was introduced again into the nation late December 2024. This crash was not an act of God; it was a catastrophe ready to occur. Just like others that now we have had prior to now, this shouldn’t be swept below the carpet. We have had related instances whereby the federal government expressed shock, constituted examine panel after which let no matter suggestion made to collect mud. With this newest tragedy, Nigerians have to be made to know the circumstances surrounding the crash in an effort to keep away from future occurrences.
As a folks, we’re bored with routine probes that yield no actionable change. This crash should not be swept below the carpet below the guise of “national security”. Nigerians should have entry to the detailed info. We should perceive the explanation for the demise of the nation’s most interesting officers via avoidable deaths.
Also, the video being proven the general public from the search-and-recovery operation is unacceptable. The deployment of swamp buggy excavator to the cite of the crash for the retrieval of the crash victims is crude, which doesn’t solely destroy crucial forensic proof but additionally compromises human dignity. In the twenty first century, regardless of the progress that has been made in crash website protocols, Nigeria nonetheless mobilises heavy industrial earthmovers to deal with very delicate restoration mission.
I need to ask, the place is the Nigerian Safety Investigation Bureau in all these? An accident website is an lively forensic scene, not some dredging canal. This follow of utilizing civil development gear for restoration have to be stopped forthwith. The National Emergency Management Agency should rework the nation’s search-and-rescue protocol. Ordinarily, we ought to be seeing instruments comparable to aspect scan sonars, submersible Remotely Operated Vehicles (ROVs) that may find the place the wreckage is, with accuracy, not the crude methodology which is greatest fitted to drainage desilting.
Kazeem Olalekan Israel, Ibadan
