Dana Air crash: Victims families urge release of final accident report

Aviation lawyers representing the families of Dana Air crash victims have written to Ministers of Aviation and Transport, praying them to direct the Accident Investigation Bureau (AIB) to release the final report of the accident.

The aircraft, Dana Air McDonnell Douglas MD-83 aircraft, had crashed in Lagos in June 2012, killing over 150 passengers, along with six crew and ten members of the public on the ground.

Four years on, families of victims are still waiting for the final report of the accident to be published by the relevant authorities.

According to the letters sent to them on September 2, 2016, the families, about 26 of them, along with their lawyers at the law firm of Irwin Mitchell, from Nigeria and US, want the ministers to facilitate the release of the report.
Preliminary investigation suggests the crash was caused by a loss of power from the engines, but the exact cause of the power loss and key evidence from the Cockpit Voice Recorder, which survived the crash, has not yet been revealed.

“Many of the families, who lost loved ones in the flight are still waiting for the final accident report to be published four years after the tragedy. The delay has prevented understanding of the cause of the crash.

“Failure to publish the report has also meant that potentially important lessons about flight safety may not have been learned, which could prevent a similar disaster from happening.

“The crash led to the death of more than 150 passengers and crew. It is astonishing that the families who lost loved ones in this tragedy are still waiting for answers about the circumstances that led to the crash. No good reason has been given for the delay in publication of the report,” Clive Garner, a Partner and Head of Irwin Mitchell’s International Personal Injury and Aviation Law said.

Garner maintained that lack of information has been extremely distressing.

He said: “Added to this, the delay in publication of the report has meant families have been unable to conclude their claims for compensation arising from the Dana Air disaster. We wrote to the Nigerian ministers for Aviation and Transportation on September 2, 2016, in the hope that they will take every possible step to ensure that the accident report is released immediately. We have not yet received a response,” he declared.