Wole Shadare, Author at Aviation metric

The Banking Problem in African Skies

Posted on August 24, 2026 by Wole Shadare

There are industries in which money follows opportunity. Aviation is one of them. There are also industries in which the absence of appropriate financing prevents the opportunity from ever becoming a reality. African aviation belongs increasingly to the second category. The continent has people who want to travel, businesses that need to move, airports that want to expand, airlines that want to acquire aircraft, cargo operators that need equipment, maintenance companies that need facilities and…

LAAC summit sets stage for discourse on govt’ revenue demands, sector’s growth

Posted on August 23, 2026 by Wole Shadare

The 30th Annual Conference of the League of Airport and Aviation Correspondents (LAAC) is set to provide a major platform for stakeholders in Nigeria’s aviation industry to examine the delicate balance between government revenue demands and the need to sustain the sector’s growth and competitiveness. The conference, scheduled for September 10, 2026, in Lagos, will be held under the theme: “Towards a Sustainable Aviation Industry: Balancing Government Revenue Demands with Sector Growth.” The landmark…

Qatar Airways accelerates fleet-wide Starlink rollout on 150 wide-body aircraft

Posted on August 21, 2026August 21, 2026 by Wole Shadare

Qatar Airways, the operator of the world’s first and largest Starlink-equipped wide-body fleet, has become the first airline to operate Starlink-equipped Boeing 787-9 aircraft globally. The carrier has also completed Starlink rollout across its Boeing 787-8 sub-fleet in seven months, bringing the total number of its Starlink-equipped wide-body aircraft to 150. The airline remains on track to complete the Starlink rollout across its Boeing 787 fleet by the end of 2026. The latest achievement builds on…

Tailwinds, late touchdown, inoperative autobrake preceded Benin airport runway overrun

Posted on August 21, 2026August 21, 2026 by Wole Shadare

NSIB issues four critical advisories over Benin airport runway overrun ATC line of sight obstructed, missing runway condition reports in Benin incident The Nigerian Safety Investigation Bureau (NSIB) has released its preliminary report on the runway excursion involving an Embraer ERJ 170-100LR aircraft operated by Enugu Air Limited at the Oba Akenzua II Airport in Benin, Edo State. The incident, which occurred on 23 July 2026 at about 14:55 local time, involved the scheduled passenger…

NSIB running on deficit budgets over NIMASA, NRC non-compliance

Posted on August 21, 2026 by Wole Shadare

The Director-General of the Nigerian Safety Investigation Bureau (NSIB), Captain Alex Badeh Jr., has raised serious concerns over severe funding deficits that threaten the bureau’s expanding multimodal accident investigation operations. Under the NSIB Establishment Act of 2022, agencies such as the Nigerian Maritime Administration and Safety Agency (NIMASA) and the Nigerian Railway Corporation (NRC) are required to remit statutory percentages of revenue to the bureau. Non-compliance has forced the NSIB to operate on deficit budgets,…

Dangerous Game: Overwritten cockpit recorders, threat to air safety

Posted on August 18, 2026August 18, 2026 by Wole Shadare

The ‘overwriting’ of flight data recorder (FDR) is an insidious operational vulnerability that has continued to compromise global aviation safety, writes WOLE SHADARE In the delicate architecture of modern commercial aviation, trust is anchored to a small, brightly painted orange cylinder buried in the tail section of an aircraft: the Cockpit Voice Recorder (CVR). For decades, this crash-survivable device, colloquially called the black box, has served as the ultimate arbiter of truth. It captures ambient sounds,…

United Nigeria Airlines Injects N20m to Rescue Chinua Achebe Fiction Prize for 10 Years

Posted on August 17, 2026 by Wole Shadare

United Nigeria Airlines (UNA) has stepped in to safeguard Nigeria’s literary heritage with a N20 million commitment to sponsor the annual Chinua Achebe Prize for Fiction for the next decade. The deal, administered by the Association of Nigerian Authors (ANA), guarantees an annual grant of N2 million over 10 years, effectively shielding the prestigious literary award from the uncertainties of government funding cycles. The long-term sponsorship agreement was finalised following high-level discussions between the Executive…

Minister petitions IATA over Osubi airport code ‘QRW’, orders airlines to drop ‘Warri’ label

Posted on August 17, 2026August 17, 2026 by Wole Shadare

In a bid to resolve lingering geographic and operational misalignments in Nigeria’s airspace data, the Minister of Aviation and Aerospace Development, Festus Keyamo, has formally petitioned the International Air Transport Association (IATA) to review the three-letter location code assigned to Osubi Airport in Delta State. The airport currently operates under the IATA code QRW and the ICAO indicator DNSU. Keyamo argues that the existing IATA code leans heavily on the broader Warri identity rather than…

IATA and Africa: What Have You Done for Me Lately?

Posted on August 17, 2026 by Wole Shadare

There is a particular question that every long-standing relationship eventually invites: What have you done for me lately? It is not necessarily always an accusation. Sometimes it is an invitation to take stock. Sometimes it is a demand for evidence. And sometimes it is simply the question asked by someone who has heard the promises for long enough and would now like to see the results. For African aviation, that question may reasonably be put to…

N500bn Drain: Reclassifying NCAA as a cost-recovery body critical for safe skies

Posted on August 17, 2026August 17, 2026 by Wole Shadare

For years, the Federal Government has treated the Nigerian Civil Aviation Authority (NCAA) as a national cash cow, misclassifying it as a “revenue-generating agency.” Under the sweeping automatic deduction policy, an estimated N500 billion ($362 million) derived from the 5% Ticket Sales Charge (TSC) and Cargo Sales Charge (CSC) has been systematically drained from the agency into the Consolidated Revenue Fund and the Treasury Single Account (TSA). To bureaucrats in Abuja, this half-a-trillion-naira windfall looked…

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