In a brief chat with pressmen recently, the Director General (DG) and Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of the Nigerian Meteorological Agency (NiMET), Prof. Mansur Bako Matazur shed light on harmattan and its impact on the aviation industry in Nigeria, especially pertaining to runway visibility. The brief exchange with journalists occurred on December 10, 2021, after NiMET bagged Air Transport Quarterly (ATQ) Magazine’s award for the Most Impactful Agency of the year.
According to the NiMET boss, low visibility is the major problem during any period of harmattan because of the resulting delays in the processes of aircraft landing and take-off. In his own words, “We have a Horizontal Visibility threshold which is required for the smooth landing and take-off at every airport; but when visibility is so poor that you cannot have clear horizontal vision, it results in the delay of take-off and landing of aircraft at some airports.”
The DG divulged the two ways in which his Agency handles the low-visibility problem:
- NiMET, he said, delivers weather updates “as quickly as possible, with thirty (30) minutes intervals.”
- The Agency deploys a Runway Visual Range – an aid-vision machine which when placed along the runway can allow aircraft land even at weather minimal level (about 300 metres).
Commenting on a situation in the past in which international flights diverted to neighbouring countries to land due to poor visibility, the CEO hit the nail on the head: “Aircraft no longer need to divert to neighbouring countries to land because calibration of the Category 3 ILS has been successfully done in all the major airports. This was executed in collaboration with NAMA, as they are the primary consumers of our services.”
The NiMET Chief explained further, that poor weather conditions which engender flight delays are not peculiar to Nigeria; they are an occurrence even in cities like New York. According to him, sometimes, weather conditions could be so poor that flights would be delayed no matter the aid-vision equipment available.
On this note, he urged pilots and crew members to always attend briefings, as feedback from them who fly is primordial to put together NiMET’s forecast evaluation: “We have upgraded the pilot briefing at two (2) airports in Lagos and at the one in Abuja, and next week, we’re going to invite the media to witness the commissioning”, he said.
