Bellview Airlines:
Bellview Airlines is an airline based in Lagos, Nigeria. It is privately owned and operates domestic, regional and international scheduled passenger services. Its main base is Murtala Mohammed International Airport, Lagos[1].
[edit] History
Bellview Travels Limited, a Lagos based travel agency metarmorphosed into Bellview Airlines in [1992] after it embarked on executive charter operations with a Yakovlev [Yak-40]. In 1993 it began scheduled domestic passenger services using a leased Douglas DC-9-30. An affiliate company, Bellview Airlines (Sierra Leone) was established in 1995, but has since been merged back into the parent company. It has 308 employees[1].
The Nigerian government set a deadline of April 30, 2007 for all airlines operating in the country to re-capitalise or be grounded, in an effort to ensure better services and safety. The airline satisfied the Nigerian Civil Aviation Authority (NCAA)’s criteria in terms of re-capitalisation and was re-registered for operation.[2]
[edit] Destinations
Bellview Airlines operates domestic scheduled services linking Lagos with three cities, as well as regional services to 10 destinations in Central and West Africa. It also operates long-haul services between Lagos and London and Johannesburg.
Bellview Airlines operates the following services (at May 2008):
[edit] Africa
[edit] Europe
[edit] Incidents and accidents
- On October 22, 2005, Bellview Airlines Flight 210, a Boeing 737 aircraft with 117 people on board, crashed shortly after taking off from Lagos en route to the Nigerian capital Abuja. Early reports from Oyo state government officials claimed that at least half of those on board survived the crash, but later retracted that statement saying that that “the latest reports coming to us say that all the people on the plane died.” Confusion at the crash site was given as a cause for the mistaken figure. CNN reports that poor weather may have contributed to the crash. The crash inquiry is being aided by officials from Boeing and the United States National Transportation Safety Board. The flight data recorders have not yet been recovered, though pieces of their casing have been found. Angus Ozoka, a Nigerian official leading the crash investigation, said he believes the recorders were destroyed in the impact. Bellview resumed flights on October 24, 2005.[3]
- On December 19, 2005, a Bellview flight made an emergency landing at Kotoka International Airport in Accra, Ghana. The Boeing 737 was on a flight from Lagos to Freetown, Sierra Leone when crew detetected a hydraulic systems failure. The following day, Nigerian authorities ordered all Bellview flights grounded and revoked Bellview's license. [2] An aviation task force changed the revocation to a suspension on December 22, 2005, giving Bellview the possibility of operating again once their equipment and procedures pass task force inspection. [4]. Bellview has since been re-authorized and resumed flight operations.
The Bellview Airlines fleet consists of the following aircraft (at May 2008):
As of February 2008, the average age of the Bellview Airlines fleet is 25 years ([3]).
[edit] External links
[edit] References
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Airlines of Nigeria |
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Members of the International Air Transport Association |
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Asia-Pacific regional office |
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China and North Asia regional office |
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Latin America and the Caribbean regional office |
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Middle East and North Africa regional office |
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North America regional office |
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Russia and the CIS regional office |
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