Passengers on an Abuja-bound Aero Contractors flight on Wednesday blocked their Port Harcourt counterparts from boarding at the Murtala Mohammed International Airport, Lagos.
The NEXT EDITION learnt that trouble started at about 2.pm when the airline announced its Port Harcourt flight.
A passenger who spoke to this newspaper said the Aero Contractors Abuja-bound flight was billed to take off at 10.30am.
According to her, passengers were checked in as early as 8.am and waited till midday without any serious information from the operators of the service.
“We were checked from 8.am and some passengers even arrived earlier. We waited from then till about 2 pm and nobody told us what was happening.
“While we were still waiting for information from the airline, they announced a flight to Port Harcourt and requested the passengers to proceed for boarding.
“That was when we all moved out and insisted on boarding the flight before the Port Harcourt passengers and they invited security operatives to calm people down to no avail,” the source told our correspondent.
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When contacted, the Managing Director of the airline, Ado Sanusi, regretted the delay and blamed it on a faulty air conditioning system on the operational aircraft.
Mr. Sanusi said the airline was working to rectify the problem based on internationally acceptable safety procedure, adding that the delay was not deliberate or intended to weary out the passengers.
While he apologised for the delay, he, however, deplored the action of the passengers who blocked the airline from boarding its Port Harcourt-bound passengers, describing the action as “hijack.”
“We are sorry about the delay. We wouldn’t deliberately keep our esteemed passengers waiting. But it was wrong to block the aircraft from operations. It is not allowed anywhere in the world.
“The problem is that people have lost confidence in the system and they cannot report to the system for restitution. That is why they resort to self-help by blocking the aeroplane or beating up the airline staff or holding some airline staff hostage and the airline will react to that,” Mr. Sanusi said.
