Ibom Air has ushered in a new era of commercial air travel today with the inaugural flight of its Airbus A220-300.
The state-of-the-art aircraft touched down at Lagos Murtala Muhammed International Airport (LOS) at 3:45 pm, marking the beginning of scheduled service between Uyo and Lagos.
This highly anticipated arrival marks the first of ten A220-300s ordered by Ibom Air in November 2021.
The aircraft, bearing registration 5N-CDA, arrived at the airline’s Uyo base in December 2023 following a journey from Mirabel, Canada.
Flight QI515, piloted by Captains Arif Jana and Adebayo Odunsi, carried 133 passengers, including Governor Umo Eno and his entourage.
The delay in commercial service was attributed to the rigorous certification process required for a new aircraft type in Nigeria.
George Uriesi, Executive Director and Chief Operating Officer of Ibom Air said, ” You know it’s a new aeroplane in Nigeria. It’s new for us, new for the Nigerian Civil Aviation Authority (NCAA), and ICAO (International Civil Aviation Organization) was also auditing this period. The NCAA followed everything to the latter and we are happy for it also”.
Uriesi emphasized the thoroughness of the process, including pilot training and demonstration flights.
According to the Ibom Air ED/COO, ‘It takes time to do and even after that the time it took to check out pilots took a bit. But they are done with their demo flights”..
“Eventually, we are ready, thank God we have started today. We are looking at the aeroplane operating, it will operate between Lagos and Abuja from tomorrow and then the second one is on its way”, he added.
“We expect it to come in between May and June. We are looking forward to a positive immediate future.
He said, “Two new aeroplanes with a fleet of five CRJs and we’d be back to where we were before the two A320 wet leases and then we grow from there.”
