Less than 24 hours after a chartered aircraft lost its tyres and landing gear at Nnamdi Azikiwe International Airport, Abuja, another plane, a commercial aircraft belonging to Dana Air, hit a fence at the facility with its left wing on Friday.

It was gathered that Dana flight, with registration number 5N-DEV from Port Harcourt, brushed the fence while trying to park after it landed at the NAIA.

Sources at the airport and passengers onboard the flight told our correspondent that no injury was recorded, but blamed the aircraft’s pilot for the incident.

Narrating what happened, a source said, “The Dana plane hit its wing on a fence while trying to park after it landed at the airport. This happened around 4.30pm and the number of the aircraft is 5N-DEV.

The plane came into Abuja from Port Harcourt.

“From what we see on the ground, it’s like the pilot is the one at fault because he has refused to disembark from the plane. All the passengers have disembarked without any injury, but the pilot is still on the plane right now as I speak with you. After he landed the plane, he moved the aircraft to where it should be parked but struck an iron fence in the process.”

The source added, “Officials of Federal Airports Authority of Nigeria are on ground to either tow the aircraft or work on it, depending on the extent of the damage and they want to use a NAHCO tow van. The part that brushed and entered the fence was the left wing of the aircraft.

“The pilot should be blamed because from every indication he did not listen or follow instructions by the aircraft marshaller. The marshaller was directing the Air Peace aircraft in front of the Dana plane, but the pilot refused to wait for the Air Peace plane and went ahead to park on his own. This resulted in the incident because if he had waited, this wouldn’t have happened.”

The spokesperson for FAAN, Mrs Henrietta Yakubu, confirmed the development but stated that the plane only hit a noise breaker stationed on the tarmac.

She said, “There are these things we put on the air side that we call noise breakers to stop noise and exhaust from getting to people. It is not really a fence, but they are just there like pillars to reduce noise and fumes from exhaust pipes and the plane just scrapped it and continued on its way.

“So there is nothing to worry about the incident. It didn’t affect the flight, the plane continued and it parked. It was the wing that scrapped the noise breaker and the plane continued until it parked.”

Spokesperson for Dana Air, Mr Ezenwa Okwudili, said the firm’s engineers were working on the aircraft to ascertain the extent of damage on the plane.

“It is the wing tip that was affected and our engineers are looking at it to determine the extent of damage. They will work on it tonight (Friday night) and I don’t think the aircraft was parked where it will obstruct anything. It’s a tip of the wing and not a serious issue,” he said.

Punch