We are developing capacity to investigate Maritime, road and air accidents – NSIB DG By Lanre Abdul

The Nigeria Safety Investigation Bureau (NSIB), an agency under the Federal Ministry of Aviation and Aerospace Development has attained the status of the National Transportation Investigation Board of the United State with the mandate to investigate accidents and incidents in all modes of transportation including Air, Maritime, Railway and Road Transportation.

Having built sufficient capacity and expertise in air investigation, the bureau is beefing up capacity in other modes. How seamless will this be? The Director-General, Capt. Alex Badeh Jr., in this interview, explained that manuals and procedures are being developed to help in the investigation of incidents and accidents in other modes.

What were some of the challenges you encountered 16 years after you took over the mantle of leadership of the NSIB?

It was a new job for me. I was used to being in the flight deck with a crew of two or seven, now dealing with 330 employees with different backgrounds, different wants and needs. So there was that challenge. Of course funding was and still is a challenge in NSIB but we have been able to cajole here and there, we just need a little bit more funding to make us a little bit more stable. Of course stability is not just what you want, you want to stay in a comfortable state over the next year, you know we are multimodal now. The same way we have done in aviation, we want to contribute our capacity and expertise in maritime, road, rail and other modes of transportation Nigeria. So that is our focus this year.

In terms of discharging your mandate, when you came on board, how many accidents did you meet on ground and how many of those reports have you completed?

I don’t have the total number on my head but I know we did 16 reports last year which is a huge number considering that they have been there for more than four years, some three years and I inherited half of those myself. We had 16 reports on air accidents, we did one Maritime which was the Anambra boat incident. We are working on an Investigative Procedure Manual for the Maritime sector which will be ready by the end of May latest so that we can hold stakeholders’ engagement.

We are done with the Rail manual and I am sure this year we would be done with those two and we would  be a full-fledged investigative agency for rail and maritime.

From the recent incidents we had, you see majorly tyre bursts and aircraft overshooting the runway, why do we have this pattern?

We haven’t had final reports with burst tyre but we have had preliminary reports and I do not want to speculate until we have the final reports for the Dana, Xejet and Allied Air incidents. For all of those, it wasn’t really a tyre burst. If you have read the report about Allied Air, it seems like a systemic issue in the operation but the investigation is still ongoing.

For Dana, I know they had a gear issue before it touched down. For the Xejet, so far there was no issue with the airplane. But when the final reports come out, you would have a definite answer on the issues. Each of these incidents touched on different issues and not essentially tyre bursts.

An average member of the Nigerian flying public tends to get agitated with some of these issues, are there really causes for concern in terms of safety of our operation?

There should always be concern. Safety concerns everybody, it concerns all of us as aviators, we should always be vigilant. I will say safety is everybody’s concern but I will not say we should be overly concerned with the state of the aviation industry in Nigeria. We know in the past four months, there has been a rash of crashes around the world. It is just one of those years, accidents do happen. By and large this year we have had it pretty safe, there has not been any loss of life or any air accident. So I will say we are pretty safe, you saw what happened with the Max Air, they stood them down to have their audit and since the regulator has said they passed the audit, they have continued to fly. We should be able to trust the regulator to do the job and do the job thoroughly. So I would say, based on the trend in the past six months in Nigeria and the NCAA’s oversight, I can say we are pretty safe.

Now talking about other modes of transportation like the Maritime, you just spoke about coming up with procedures and manuals, what is the level of collaboration with these agencies?

I will give the Nigeria Inland Waterways Authority (NIWA) special commendation. They seem to have picked up with the pace. Our relationship is more cordial. You know the Minister of Marine and Blue Economy set up a Task Force to get to the roots of all these boat mishaps and waterway accidents. They co-opted our Maritime Experts at NSIB and all the other people concerned. For others, we wait and see. Once we have our regulations out, we would bring them in, in a stakeholders’ forum to get their buy-in.

For now since they don’t have our regulations, I will be able to answer your question very well by the time they have our regulations and see the work we are doing.

Again with the maritime sector, at the level of the IMO (the International Maritime Organisation), NSIB is the only recognised maritime accident investigation agency in Nigeria. It used to be NIMASA. As part of their Act, they have an investigative part as a unit but it is not their responsibility. Because IMO did not know about NSIB, they left the investigation part with NIMASA but they are now aware of the NSIB and they are aware of our manual. In fact we actually developed our manual in collaboration with IMO experts. Once we get the manual out this year, I think there would be no question again as to who are accident investigators for Maritime in Nigeria.

So you now interface with the IMO?

Yes we are as an agency of government and with our manual. IMO experts are deeply involved with our manual.

What about the manpower resources especially for the maritime sector?

Yes definitely we are building that. Before the end of the year we would have some maritime experts coming on board.

In terms of collaboration, the Act establishing NSIB said some of the maritime agencies should pay certain amount of money to you from their IGR

Unfortunately when it comes to money we don’t cooperate. I see NIMASA as a groom with many brides and they are playing favourites with some of their brides and leaving some of the other ones to decide. It is something we have to look into at some point and hopefully we would get the presidency involved if need be because it is what the law stipulates no matter the argument about it not being in their Act. The National Assembly passed our own law and it is being signed by the Presidency.

What about the railway sector, I know the NSIB took over the investigation of some railway accidents, how far about that?

My focus is to get the manuals done. Like the maritime manual is being done. These are the building blocks you need to get. A house built on a faulty foundation would crumble. So for me it is building that solid foundation. We are solid in the air.

Once our manuals are ready this year, even those accidents that we have had, we would revisit them and releasing reports in those areas.

Have you started discussion with the railway leadership?

We met with the last leadership of NRC, we have not met with the new one. We have an MoU with the railway and we need to revisit that and reactivate the MoU. Also, we have the regulations for the railway already, we just need to get the policies and procedures and we would tie those together and we would invite the NRC as a major stakeholder. So by the end of this year, we would be a fully-fledged accident investigation agency to investigate maritime, rail, road and air.

How will you describe the state of aviation industry in Nigeria?

I think we are within yellow and green but again nothing is perfect but I believe and I know that most of the operators are operating within the confines of safety and I believe that the NCAA is pushing hard to make sure that the airlines are operating safely.

I would say pretty good now, I won’t go as far as saying green but we are in high yellow right now. There is always room for improvement and for me that is all that matters. So I would give us high yellow considering what is going on in the world.

There were concerns recently from the U.S. State Department that Nigerian airports are generally unsafe and as a safety organisation, how will you react to this?

I think that is an unfair comment. While there is always room for improvement, the NSIB does not concur with the assessment that Nigerian airports are generally unsafe. It’s crucial to consider the context and metrics used in such evaluations. We recognise the need for continuous improvement, and we commend the efforts of the Federal Airports Authority of Nigeria (FAAN) in implementing upgrades.