Aero Contractors Limited on Thursday completed a C-check on a Boeing 737 aircraft from its recently approved Maintenance, Repair and Overhaul facility at the Murtala Muhammed Airport, Lagos, followed by a test flight.
The airline noted that the maintenance check on one of the planes in its fleet was the first time a C-check would be carried out on a wide bodied aircraft since the liquidation of Nigeria Airways in 2004.
According to airline operators, C-checks often done outside the country have been a major problem due to the high cost of at least $1m per aircraft.
The airline said engineers commenced work on the aircraft less than a month ago and successfully carried out the check.
The Managing Director, Aero Contractors, Capt. Ado Sanusi, said the airline’s engineers worked on the aircraft while its pilots successfully carried out the verification flight, adding that the management was satisfied with the outcome of the check.
Sanusi stated that the successful verification of the aircraft was a major milestone not just for the airline, but for the entire aviation industry as well as the country.
“With this achievement, the era of flying out aircraft for maintenance by Nigerian airlines is over. The entire country will benefit a lot from the outcome,” he said.
According to him, the Nigerian Civil Aviation Authority had in the last quarter of 2017 approved the airline’s hangar to carry our C-checks on Boeing 737 aircraft, the commonly used plane for commercial flight operations in the country.
“After the check, we put the aircraft up for verification flight and everyone was very happy about the result. This is the first time this would be happening in the country. We are more satisfied with the result than what we get outside the country when we take out our airplanes for checks. Our engineers are happy and we are equally satisfied,” he added.
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