British Airways flight lands in Lagos with 253 Nigerians evacuated from UK

THE DAILY VENDOR has learnt that no fewer than 253 Nigerians who opted for evacuation from the United Kingdom (UK) by the Nigerian Government arrived the Murtala Muhammed International Airport (MMIA), Lagos.

It was gathered that the British Airways flight, a Boeing 747 BA9155 with registration Number G-CIVO, which conveyed the Nigerian citizens back home, touched down at Lagos Airport at 1.45pm, yesterday, Friday, May 8.

The Nigeria Foreign Affairs Minister, Geoffrey Onyeama who confirmed this on Twitter yesterday said the evacuees were scheduled to proceed to Abuja where they will be quarantined for the mandatory 14 days.

“First Set of Nigerians evacuated from the UK arrived Lagos enroute Abuja where the evacuees will be quarantined for mandatory 14 days,” he tweeted.

It was however gathered that the evacuees were kept onboard the aircraft for more than 30 minutes and were later disembarked through a motorised gangway rather than the avio-bridge.

The Minister while explaining reasons for the delays apologized to the passengers, while promising a smoother operations subsequently.

“We apologize profusely to those passengers who had to spend more time in Lagos than was planned and in conditions that were not comfortable.

“We had wanted the UK flight to come directly to Abuja, where passengers will be quarantined, but it wasn’t possible. It had to land in Lagos, and we’ve had to make arrangements to fly passengers from Lagos to Abuja with @flyairpeace.

“@British_Airways flight organised by the UK Government to evacuate British nationals from Lagos, and coming to Abuja would have exceeded the hours for the pilot.

“This required a lot of coordination at many different levels and unfortunately we didn’t get it right and the result is that passengers had to wait for unreasonably long hours at the airport in Lagos before connecting to Abuja

“Henceforth, all the arrangements are for flights coming in to only go to the final destination, so we will not have to grapple with complicated situations like this,” Onyeama said.

The British Airways aircraft however repatriated 215 British nationals who were already waiting at the Lagos airport.

The evacuees were the second batch in a series of evacuation scheduled to bring home about 4,000 Nigerians stranded abroad.

THE DAILY VENDOR reports that the first batch of 262 Nigerian evacuees were flown into the country on Wednesday from the United Arab Emirates (UAE) via the Lagos Airport.