NAMA: The challenge of aeronautical message handling systems

Good aircraft and good flight crew operating in unsecured skies are potential tragedies without safe air corridors, monitored round the clock by well-trained technical crew, modern and regularly maintained tracking systems, the best pilot flying the best aircraft would be a mere accident waiting to happen.

This shows that operations of the Nigerian Airspace Management Agency ,(NAMA), are very critical to the success of the aviation sector in the country being that, for an aircraft to take off from one airport and lands safely at another, depends largely on how efficient the agency functions.

Apart from provision of landing aids and dissemination of weather information to pilots, NAMA has contributed significantly to improving safety in the nation’s airspace since the crashes of 2005 and 2006, more than any other aviation agencies.
Experts have, lately observed that since then, the airspace has been calm and safe for all stakeholders, due to the technical prowess of NAMA and other agencies in industry.

A good indicator to NAMA’s contribution to the safety enjoyed by all, is the recently published reports on aircraft serious incident and accident reports by Accident Investigation Bureau (AIB).
On March 13th this year, AIB released its final reports on Dana Airlines, Bristow Helicopters, OAS Helicopters, and the one involving Presidential Implementation Committee on Maritime Safety and Security (PICOMSS).

One salient issue contained in the report is that most of the air mishaps or incidents have no bearing on the safety or otherwise of the airspace.

With the way the new management, led by Captain Fola Akinkuotu, is going, it is expected that NAMA will succeed in continuous delivering of safe skies to the country and beyond. Within a very short period of time, the new helmsman has strongly shown the determination to ensure speedy completion of the AIS Automation project in view of the centrality of the project to the success of the ongoing global migration from Terrestrial Based Navigation to Satelite Based Navigation (PBN).

Preparatory to the commencement of Aeronautical Information Services (AIS) Automation, NAMA had last year embarked on the training of various categories of personnel in order to build adequate capacity needed for its deployment. In line with that, different batches of NAMA personnel have gone to Frankfurt, Germany for short Train-the-Trainer Course on Map/Chart/e-AIP Publication. These trainings were done, ahead of the deployment of Aeronautical Fixed Telecom Network (AFTN)/ ATS Message Handling System (AMHS) in Lagos and Kano.

It was gathered that these operators’ training conducted by Avitech GMBH at the company’s factory in Germany are critical components of the AIS Automation Project, targeted at giving trainees the needed exposure to handle the complex situations associated with the project.

To show his strong commitment, the Managing Director of NAMA, Captain Akinkuotu re-echoed his intentions to judiciously implement the project at the recent World AIS Day held in May 15 this year. In view of critical deliverables of the Aeronautical Information Management (AIM) project, such as, the enhancement of e-NOTAM, e-Flight Planning, e-AIP, e-TOD, e-Charts, e-Flight briefing etc, Akinkuotu warned that the project must be taken seriously.

Akinkuotu said that, given that the automation represents a global migration to a dynamic data-oriented aeronautical information management system that facilitates the timely exchange of aeronautical information in an accurate and standardized format from anywhere to everywhere globally, on real-time basis, the automation project is a must-do for NAMA.”

The NAMA boss said that for the dream of AIS automation to be realized, it behoves on staff of the department to put in their best to see that their service both at the individual and group level remains invaluable, adding that they could do this through extensive research and paper presentation at seminars, targeted at enriching the system and taking it to the next level.

He promised to open his doors to their professional and technical advice which he said would give him the needed guidance in taking key decisions.

The NAMA helmsman also lauded the orkers of the AIS department for their diligence, hard work and dedication to duty, saying, “AIS remains one of the most critical departments in the agency even though they are hardly given the prominence they deserve, because their job most often, is behind-the-scene,” he said, stressing that the absence of AIS in the system will bring about chaos in the entire civil aviation.

In his views, General Manager, AIS, Mr Kabir Gusau, appealed to NAMA’s management to consider the periodic training and retraining of AIS personnel, which, according to him, “would bring staff up to speed with modern trends in a dynamic aviation industry and also prepare them to effectively embrace automation when fully deployed.”

Gusau also harped on the need for the agency, through the Nigerian Civil Aviation Authority (NCAA), to ensure that qualified AIS personnel were licensed as this would bolster them towards hard work, commitment to duty and enhanced productivity.

Also as part of efforts to improve safety, the agency has already pledged its readiness in landing aircraft at zero visibility, just as the agency also revealed its plan to install Instrument Landing Systems (ILS) in no fewer than 18 airports nationwide to ensure safety in the airspace.

Captain Akinkuotu, who made the pledge recently, assured that the country has Category 2 ILS’; and have bought 11 new ones, which it would be putting in airports, including Minna, Benin, Ibadan and some other places, while using others recovered on other airports.

He said the Category 2 ILS is effective enough to bring down an aircraft from at least 100feet from elevation and visibility of less than 800metres up to 1000 feet.

“We might also add that quite often we hear our pilots talk about what kind of capabilities we have in the harmattan and this system is a category 2 ILS which will bring us down to at least a 100feet to from elevation and visibility of less than 800 metres up to 1000feet, which is quite good. Our Harmattan can be bad, but I am sure that for 95%, if not 100% of the time with an operable ILS Category 2 system, we should be able to get it every time. So come December there should be no reason or no excuse”, Akinkuotu said.

On replication, Akinkuotu added,” Government has tried, we have an order, contracts for 11 ILS, I know there is Lagos, Port Harcourt, Minna, Benin there is Abuja, Kaduna, but they are 11 that are going to be installed. They are brand new but don’t forget that we are going to recover some items, Lagos has an ILS and I think Ibadan too is going to get from the new ones so whatever we recover, we will put them at some of the other airports. I would expect that over time when all of the assets are in we should be able to do not less than 18 fields.”

On the means of installation, the NAMA Chief executive hailed the dexterity of the agencies’ engineers stating that they have been doing quite a great job over the years even when under appreciated.

“I must say here that it was done by NAMA engineers , which sometimes they are not given the kind of recognition they deserve. Contractors tell us that they fixed it, but they (NAMA) engineers, fixed it and they have done a very good job, as we have calibrated it,” Akinkuotu said.

In addition, it was gathered that the ILS/DME and VOR/DME in Kaduna, Kano, Katsina, Sokoto, Lagos, Enugu, Port Harcourt and Bauchi airports were calibrated by South African Flight Calibration Company (FSCL) before the closure of Abuja airport for repairs of the runway recently.

Commenting on their facilities, Airspace Manager of Murtala Mohammed International Airport, Lagos, Mr. Lawrence Ajayi said that, Runway 18R, has precision approach lighting system, which is one of the best in the industry, while 18L has simple approach lighting system, because it is not busy at night, saying that both of them are working at optimal levels.
On the radios, he said Radio Frequency 127.3mhz has an improved range; and is working perfectly, just as, the Radio Frequency 124.7 mhz is also in good condition and both of them are on presently.

Director of Safety Electronics and Engineering Services, Engr. Farouk Umar, who confirmed that all their equipment are in order, noted that in aviation, there is nothing like epileptic communication.

He said that,” It is either you are communicating or you are not communicating. Nigerian airspace is safe for both local and international flights.”

Meanwhile, NAMA has been able to build and instill confidence to most stakeholders including, operators, and passengers amongst others.

For instance, Chairman and CEO of Air Peace, Chief Allen Onyema has commended the Federal Government for the on-going programme to provide category two Instrument Landing System (ILS) and improved communication system at nation’s major airports.

Onyema, an airline operator, said that this would ensure smooth flight operations in December, which is the busiest season for airlines, unfortunately that is also the high point of Harmattan haze, which lowers visibility and force airlines to cancel their flights.

The Air Peace boss said airlines lost revenues amounting to millions of naira last year, due to flight cancellations, adding that the failure of the airlines to airlift thousands of passengers to their destinations last December, damaged the image and goodwill of the airlines, as passengers did not understand that the airlines were not responsible for the cancellations of flights.

“I just learnt that the Federal Government is about to install landing aids at our major airports so that flights can operate during Harmattan haze, and flight cancellations during the period, will become a thing of the past. I hail government’s decision on that.”

He said,”I have no doubt that the Minister of State, Aviation; Senator Hadi Sirika is all out to make a difference. I have no doubt, and I sincerely commend him on this. I also commend him for the speed and timeliness with which he completed the rehabilitation of the runway of the Nnamdi Azikiwe International Airport, Abuja. That was unprecedented. That was also how he made efforts for the airlines to be included in the Central Bank of Nigeria’s (CBN’s) forest window, which we benefited with manufacturers,” Onyema said.

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