High-level legal investigation underway
LEONARD NEILL
HYDRO AIR is unlikely to fly again. An announcement from South Africa’s only privately-owned scheduled freighter company is expected shortly following the crash of its single Boeing 747 freighter at Lagos Airport, Nigeria at the beginning of December.
Airline officials in Pretoria were not available for comment when approached by FTW. All were said to be ‘in meetings’.
While efforts are being made to have the damaged aircraft - still in Nigeria - repaired and possibly returned to service, crew members were approaching other airlines in Johannesburg last week seeking employment and stating they had been retrenched.
A Lagos source said that insurance investigators had surveyed the damage to the freighter. One side of its undercarriage and two engines were torn off in the landing accident, although suggestions have been made that it could be repaired and re-flown.
But repair work and major maintenance, for which the aircraft is understood to have been due, would mean a delay of up to a year in any flight plans. Reports received by the Pretoria owners at the time of the accident indicated that the runway was in a poor condition, and that air traffic controllers on duty at the time had been placed on indefinite suspension.
Further information has not been made available to the press as it is understood they form part of a high level legal investigation which is underway at present.
