7 die as air force helicopter crashes in Kaduna

A Nigeria Air Force (NAF) helicopter crashed into Ribadu Cantonment (Old NDA) in Kaduna state on Saturday, killing all seven passengers.

According to NAN, the Dornier-228 aircraft with call sign NAF030 crashed at about 6:45am.

Musa Ilallah, north west zonal coordinator of the national emergency management agency, confirmed it, saying: “We received a report that there was a helicopter crash at the old NDA.

“We immediately reached out to the red cross, civil defence corps, and the Kaduna state fire service, among others, and went for rescue.

“According to the report, the helicopter was on its way to Abuja with four crew members and three passengers, but crashed a few minutes after takeoff from the air force base, with no survivor.

“The helicopter crashed on part of a residential building and sank into the sand and luckily there was no one in the building, otherwise there would have been more casualties.”

Ilallah said that the corpses, most of which were in pieces, had been moved to the air force base hospital.

A NAN correspondent who was at the scene said women believed to be relatives of the victims were seen rolling on the ground and weeping profusely.

Sadique Abubakar, an air marshal and chief of air staff, immediately set up a panel to investigate circumstances surrounding the accident.

Dele Alonge, air commodore and director of public relations and information, who made the announcement, said the panel is headed by an air vice marshal.

He said the chief of air staff had aborted his official trip to Port Harcourt in order to immediately visit the crash site and families of some of the deceased officers.

Alonge added that the chief would be accompanied to the visit by Alikali Mamu, the air officer commanding training command.

“A Nigerian Air Force (NAF) Dornier-228 aircraft, with call sign NAF030, has crashed into a house at Ribadu Cantonment, Kaduna,” the statement said.

“Though no casualty was recorded on ground, there were no survivors among the passengers on board the aircraft. The aircraft was Abuja-bound and had taken off at about 6:4 5am from the Kaduna military airfield before the mishap.”

He said the bodies of the passengers had been recovered, while fire fighters had been mobilised to the crash site to curtail fire from spreading to buildings.

Saturday’s mishap is the second in less than three weeks, following the August 12 crash of a Bristow helicopter into a lagoon at the Oworonshoki axis of the third mainland bridge in Lagos. Of the 12 people aboard, six died while six survived.