Ibom Air takes delivery of new aircraft

The management of Ibom Air, an airline owned and managed by Akwa Ibom state government, says it has taken delivery of one more aircraft, making it four aircraft on its fleet.

Ibom Air, which is the brainchild of the  administration of Udom Emmanuel, the incumbent governor, has surpassed records in the number of passengers airlifted as well as on-time departure and arrival of flights, less than a year since it began operations.

Ibom Air which commenced commercial flight operations on June 7, 2019, with three aircraft, has reportedly airlifted 50,000 passengers within 100 days of operations and recorded 98 percent on-time flight departure, according report from the company.

Ibom Air announced the arrival of the new aircraft in a release on its official Facebook page on Wednesday, saying that the aircraft, a Bombardier CRJ 900 aircraft arrived Lagos from Calgary, Canada at 10:48 pm local time, on Tuesday.

“We are very pleased to receive the first of our two recently purchased Bombardier CRJ 900 aircraft, in line with our fleet expansion strategy. With this addition, our fleet grows to four aircraft,” the statement read.

“This particular aircraft, with registration number 5N-BXP, made its maiden commercial flight in May 2014 (just 6 years ago). Thus, Ibom Air continues to operate the lowest average fleet age amongst Nigeria’s airlines. This fleet strategy is in line with our vision to be a world-class African regional airline.”

The company said its modern fleet of Bombardier CRJ 900 aircraft comes fitted with High Efficiency Particulate Air (HEPA) filters which helps to remove contaminated air from the cabin.

“HEPA filters are high – intensity filters that do not just filter dust, but effectively capture greater than 99% of the airborne microbes in the filtered air, including microscopic particles such as bacteria and viruses. Cabin air in HEPA equipped aircraft generally pass through the filters 20-30 times per hour, removing contaminants and greatly enhancing the quality of air in the cabin,” it said.

Earlier this year, Idongesit Nkanga, chairman of Ibom Airline Company Limited and former military governor of the state, said the company was expecting two more aircraft to add to three it already has.