A destroyed refinery By Favour Ifeoluwa & Akinola Ajibade The Nigerian National Petroleum Company Limited( NNPCL) says it has destroyed 134 illegal refineries in the last few weeks. Also, the company said 63 illegal pipeline connections were uncovered during the the weeks . The corporation, In a visual report, stated that at about 2 am on Sunday, a joint team of security agents discovered a large wooden boat illicitly loading stolen crude oil from Barge AGS01 within the OML 18 operating area, noted intelligence report a large wooden wooden boat was caught receiving crude oil from the barge. According to the state-owned oil firm, while the barge was towed away with a tugboat in custody, five speedboats used in towing the large wooden boat to the illegal loading site were also detained and the particulars of the tugboats and barge used for the operation were reportedly seized for further investigation. It further said that two large boats, which involve
By Akinola Ajibade
International flights, were yesterday, prevented from landing or taking off at the Murtala Muhammed Airport.
The development, which affected the international wing of the nation's flagship airport was caused by the mangled body of a dead man found on Runaway 18R of the airport.
Neither can the identity of the corpse be ascertained nor the cause of death of the man as at of press time. While some airport officials thought that the man was probably knocked down by an aircraft taking off, others differs, as they said that the aircraft might be landing on the runaway, when the incident happened.
News Mirror gathered that the runway was temporarily shut down while a team of officials from the Federal Airports Authority of Nigeria and the Nigeria Police Force evacuated the corpse from the runway.
During the temporary shutdown of the runway, international flights were prevented from landing and taking off from the airport’s international terminal.
Among the flights that could not land due to the shutdown was an Ethiopian Airlines flight 3907, a Boeing 77F aircraft with registration number ETAVN, which was coming from Lome, Togo to Lagos, Nigeria.
The flight was later diverted back to Lome after holding for a while.
Airport officials said the corpse was suddenly found on Runway 18R during a routine runway inspection by FAAN personnel.
The officials were said to have reported a corpse on the runway around the cargo area.
The spokesperson for FAAN, Mrs. Faithful Avokerie Hope-Ivbaz, could not immediately confirm the incident, saying she had yet to be briefed on the development.
Also, the Police Public Relations Officer, Airport Command, Mr Olayinka Ojelade, said he had yet to get the requited signal on the incident.
He promised to get back. As of the time of filing this report, he had yet to do so. However, a top police official at the MMIA confirmed the development.
He said the command was called upon in the early hours of Thursday to evacuate the corpse from Runway 18R.
According to him, the police are still investigating the identity of the dead man and how he got to the security area of the international airport.
However, an aviation security expert and former Military Commandant of the MMIA, Group Captain John Ojikutu (retd.), said there was a need to investigate how the unidentified man found his way into the sensitive area of the airport, describing the incident as a major security breach.
According to him, the perimeter fence of the MMIA is not a security fence, adding that this has exposed the airport to various security breaches.
Ojikutu said, “The authorities need to investigate how the man got to the airport. Nobody can say much now; but he may have been knocked down by the wingspan or undercarriage of a jumbo jet but it is too early to say anything like that now. But we need to examine the issue of houses that have been built too close to the Lagos airport. The rule says no building should be situated less than six metres to the airport structure or fence. However, we have seen cases of people crossing the runway before.
“The Nigerian Civil Aviation Authority and FAAN need to investigate this to ascertain what really happened. They need to find out the flights that landed before that incident. The current airport perimeter fence is not a security fence and we need to do something about it.”
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