Twelve years ago, the first national disaster of that year happened in Ogun state, Nigeria. In the state of current president Olusegun Obasanjo.
The venue of the Bellview Airlines Flight 210 plane crash, 12 years ago, on October 22nd, 2005. The plane was a scheduled domestic passenger flight, operating as a Boeing 737-200 aircraft from Murtala Muhammed International Airport in Lagos en route to Nnamdi Azikiwe International Airport Abuja. I am standing at the gate on the spot where the plane nosedived and crashed killing all 117 people on board.
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The report of the Investigators after the crash read thus: "The plane's captain, a 49-year-old former pilot, had been hired by Bellview after he had been working at a dairy for about 14 years, the summary read. The pilot before then, had been "shot in the head during a robbery attempt". The aircraft was a twin-engine Boeing 737-2B7, manufactured in 1981, registered in Nigeria on March 21, 2003, as 5N-BFN. The manufacturer’s serial number was 22734, it was first delivered to Maersk Air before it was acquired by Bellview airline. It flew a total of 56,000 hours before its crash.
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The flight departed Lagos at night, on 20:35, as the aircraft entered a right turn tower cobntroller told the crew to contact the approach controller. The personnel in Approach Control replied "report again passing one three zero." The pilot acknowledged at 19:32:35 UTC, and that was the last known transmission from the flight. The approach controller told the crew to next report passing 13,000 feet or when crossing the LAG beacon, this last contact was at 20:36. The pilot of Bellview Airlines Flight (BAF) 210 sent a distress signal just after taking off from Lagos for Abuja, in stormy weather at 20:45 (1945 GMT). The approach controller tried to contact Flight 210 at 20:46 but had no response. An alert was raised with the National Emergency Management Agency to start a search and rescue operation. After the crash the impact crater covered a large area and measured 57 feet by 54 feet and 30 feet deep.
The plane was carrying 111 passengers and 6 crews: Captain Imasuen Lambert from Okada, Albarka, who had logged in a total of 13.429 hours of flying experience, in which 1053 of them were on the type. Before he joined Bellview Airlines in October 2004, Lambert had worked for Imani Aviation, Okada Air, Gas Air and Kabo Airlines. He was out of active flying for 12 years, between 1992 and 2004. The Flight Officer - Eshun Ernest, was a Ghanaian, his wife was also on board, and the Flight Engineer was Sanni Steve from Imane, Olamaboro Local Government of Kogi State.
From the 111 passengers most of them were Nigerians, 10 were Ghanaians and one U.S citizen: Haydon Joseph, a US Chief of the Office of Defence Co-operation in US Embassy of Nigeria), there was also Adele Lorenzo, South African television producer. Today is 12 years that departed, MAY THEIR SOUL REST IN ETERNAL PEACE.