MY ARTICLE ON SAFETY

SECTION OF THE MMIA CAR PARK

 

 

REAL SAFETY IN THE AVAITION SECTOR: THE BASICS

By Dele Ajala-November 13, 2013

I recall growing up as a young boy under my mother’s watchful and ice melting eyes, I remember how I always succeed at “forming busy” by piling my dirty laundry together into the bath tub with the washing soap on it, strategically positioning the sweeping broom next to the door and rattling some dirty dishes all to create an atmosphere of “busyness”…hmm!!  Ofcourse, like many of us would recall we end up going to bed with most of our chores undone and a promise to do them the following day. Most often than none the cycle continues day after day...

I share this because it is a replica of daily occurrence in our beloved epileptic aviation industry. When you drive through the airport road leading to the runway tarmac of the murtala Mohammed international airport, you cannot help but notice a lot of (UN) constructive activities happening simultaneously on a daily basis. You observe tractors moving to and fro, laborers digging and pushing cement trolleys, trucks of sand and gravel being poured in every available space with no accomplishment to show for all the “forming busy” activities.

A basic project management topic comes to mind immediately, estimating, where you have the time and cost of a project. Meaning there is a start time and work completed time as well. This, for reasons best known to our aviation heads, does not exist in their work dictionary. Construction activities goes on in very funny and unimportant areas of the airport while the main areas of real concern are left totally untouched; example MMIA CAR PARK!! Just to mention a few.

 This brings me to the issue at hand, as a safety student, i ask, with all air crashes, mishaps and near fatal accidents that have occurred within the past two years in our aviation industry, do our heads (I refuse to call them leaders) in this sector actually know the meaning of safety? Are they aware of the connection between most of these incidences and a poor, dilapidated infrastructure and a degrading, uncomfortable working environment?

I do not write as an expert in aviation safety but I refer to the basics which is visible to the eyes and comprehensible by the human intellect. It is said that safety starts with you and I, let’s for the sake of this write-up believe that we all adhere to this basic knowledge, how you ask? As a passenger, airport worker, pilot, flight attendant, in addition to other safety precaution, we also ensure our shoe laces are properly tied, our bags and carry-ons are packed according standard, all dangerous items are disposed off accordingly. You set out for your flight or duty as the case maybe, or even to just receive an arriving passenger from a flight but to your dismay and unpleasant surprise, you have been on the parking lot queue for between 2-4hours. What’s the effect of these, safety-wise on a person’s psyche, emotion, output and judgment?

You decide to take a walk to see what the problem is, only to see indiscriminate and regardless parking by “unknown” persons protected by fully armed uniformed men creating bottlenecks at the entrance of the “ONLY” car park in a supposed INTERNATIONAL AIRPORT, all the way down to the end of the arrival motor way, blocked on both sides from free flow of traffic and without any recourse for passengers, workers, crewmembers who are to fly on or even worse, operate those massive machines. It is sad and shameful! Many go through and are subjected to the pain, panic, risk of missing their flights or even worse resurrecting health crisis which normally will not have occurred if basic safety was adhered to.

 We are not through, you finally get to the car park, paid the #400 gate fee only to drive in to be welcomed by all sizes and shapes of potholes, gullies, mud pools and lack of space (you then wonder what you paid for)in the name of a tarred road. As you rush in with your flight solely on your mind, you close your ears to the heart breaking knocks and bangs on your exhausts pipe, tire rods and even bumper on this car park road, with deep and sharp pothole edges and rock of age’s concrete stones right in the midst of the road. Like someone once said,” truly, only an armored and bullet proofed car can survive the murtala Mohammed international airport car park road”, alas!! Now we know why so much was claimed to have been spent on vehicles rather than the road the vehicles would ride on (funny).

By now you have a rough mental calculation of the expense your car will incur on your return from your trip either from abroad or just the arrival hall. Time and space will not permit me to outline the challenges you may face in the hands of an array of uniformed security agencies at the entrance of the departure hall. In the hall itself, you have official and unofficial touts with diverse ID cards ranging from government parastatals staff, aviation agency staff, unknown private companies, to no-ID card personnel, who have no business being at the airport, but demand for money to hasten your process at the check-in, immigration point and screening point. Just like Mr. Omojuwa said in his write-up “the shame called Murtala Mohammed international airport” it’s as if one is being punished for leaving his country or even returning to it. After going through all these at the departure hall, you then have the uphill task of waiting in a long line at the screening point, more like the proverbial cow going through the eye of the needle. Hmm!!

After all said and done, where exactly is the starting point for safety in the aviation industry? How safe can we really be with the few issues summarized above? Are these and other unmentioned issues not the little drops of water that make an ocean of mishaps and eventual calamities?

 The human factor study shows a 99% of accidents or mishaps are due to human errors as against mechanical failures. Tiredness, stress, mental relapse, psychological strain, environmental depression, lack of incentives and poor working conditions just to name a few. Is anybody looking in this direction or is it a national knowledge that has been accepted and has come to stay…….? Hmm!!

  

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