Turkish Airlines has compensated all the passengers whose luggages were delayed in the infamous Flight TK 624 scheduled service from Istanbul to Abuja.
The decision to compensate the affected passengers was sequel to the intervention of the Nigerian Civil Aviation Authority (NCAA) on the matter.
According to the General Manager, Public Affairs, NCAA, Mr Sam Adurogboye, who made this known to journalists, explained that Turkish Airlines has paid the prescribed compensation to all the passengers whose luggage were delayed in the infamous Flight TK 624 scheduled service from Istanbul to Abuja.
He further explained that the airline under the supervision of the Consumer Protection Officers (CPO) of the regulatory authority ensured that the passengers were paid full monetary compensation as contained in the Nigerian Civil Aviation Regulations (NCARs).
He also disclosed that in addition to the compensation, a cargo flight and an Airbus were arranged to freight to Abuja, Nigeria, all contentious backlog of baggage that were earlier short landed.
All the concerned passengers, he said have collected same as at the time of this report.
Adurogboye added that the compensation and ferrying of the backlog of luggage to of the affected passengers were contained in a report of the investigation carried out by NCAA over the recent Tarmac invasion by Turkish Airlines passengers submitted to the Director General of NCAA, Capt. Muhtar Usman.
The NCAA image maker stated that there were several observations and recommendations in the report and these include provision of signages informing passengers of possible penalties of unlawful acts at the airport.
The report also recommended that clear cut penalties arising from unlawful acts should be displayed to serve as deterrent to would be violators.
Others are that Close Circuit Television (CCTV) footage will be deployed and the Turkish Airlines should assist in identifying the unruly passengers for prosecution to dissuade others from carrying out similar acts. Subsequently, in the course of the final phase of the investigation, salient questions will be asked concerning airport management and that if established sanctions would be applied for violating access control requirements in the National Civil Aviation Security Programme (NCASP) chapters 4.5 (a), 6.1.4.6.2.1 and 6.3.2 and also, the requirements of the Nigerian Civil Aviation Regulations Part 17 section 17.37.1-3.
Meanwhile, NCAA has also directed the appropriate agencies to put up appropriate control mechanism strong enough to prevent unauthorized access to restricted areas of the airports forthwith.
These recommendations and others would be implemented to the letter to fore close and mitigate future occurrence.
