By ABDULWAHAB ABDULAH & ONOZURE DANIA

LAGOS—A witness,yesterday, debunked the allegation that it was the ill-fated Dana aircraft that had hydraulic problem.

Given evidence before a Lagos coroner, presided over by Mr. Alexander Komolafe, the General Manager, Air Worthiness, Nigerian Civil Aviation Authority, NCAA, Kayode Ajiboye, an engineer, said a different aircraft owned by Dana Airline with registration No- 5N-SRI, had hydraulic pressure failure in the air on May 10, 2012 while on a return trip to Lagos from Uyo, Akwa Ibom State.

According to Ajiboye, who was answering questions from lawyers, the incident preceded the June 3, 2012 aircrash of Dana aircraft with registration No. 5N-RAM.

Clarifying the hydraulic  failure issue, the witness told the coroner that the public was fed with different information that the recent aircraft involved in air accident had hydraulic pressure failure.

He said: “Because of this problem, the plane had to be  quickly cleared ahead of others, to make emergency landing on arrival in Lagos.”

He said some of the passengers who boarded the plane eventually intimated the Consumer Protection Department of NCAA to complain about the  state of the aircraft and its failed air-conditioning system.

To right the problem, Ajiboye said the affected plane was eventually sent for repairs to an aircraft maintenance and servicing company;  Mi-Technic Company Limited, Turkey.

The General Manager, added that the ill-fated Dana plane that crashed also underwent services including a flight check on June 2, 2012, a day before the crash.

He maintained that it was observed that the crashed plane did not show any sign of problem while a flight-check was carried out on it.

He added that this was why it was scheduled for flights the following day, which made it to embark on “three take-offs and two landings”, adding that it was on the return trip that it crashed at Iju-Ishaga, Lagos.

Another witness, Managing Director of SO Aviation Fuel Limited, a subsidiary of Sahara Group of Companies, Mr. Alistair Morrison revealed that his company supplied 4,000 litres of aviation fuel to Dana Airline between 5 p.m and 6 p.m a day to the crash in Abuja.

Morrison said: “On the average, we fuel about eight airlines per day, all receiving fuel from the same tankage.”