We flew from Port Harcourt (DNPO) to Lagos (DNMM) yesterday with Aero's shiny, 'new' 737-300 departing close behind and landing just ahead of us. We went up to FL310 to get out of the weather while they went steaming past three thousand feet lower and about Mach .12 faster.
They were reporting something like 60 souls, which is about a 50% load factor, I guess, and not bad for a Monday afternoon.
One of my esteemed colleagues was handling the radios, when you could almost hear how happy he was to be finally flying a proper, US American-built airplane after all those mis-spent years in helicopters and what-not. Well, that is my supposition. Certainly he sounded happier than I.
You see, they are supposed to be adding a few more Dash 8s within a couple of weeks, including one on the very run that I do, DNPO-DNSU (Osubi Air Strip). The heartless b*stards! Not that we wouldn't have done the same to them, given the chance.
The rest of it looks like the usual confusing mess of operators going down, starting up, moving sideways and all that sort of thing. Calverton, for instance, has ceased to be a topic of interest in the bar where a year ago we were all busy with the 'rumour of the week' about what they were up to. Now we just look at the new hangar and grunt skeptically.
I can never figure out what is really going on, just by using normal logic and whatever is reported in the papers and across the bar. Some outfit starts up with some big-big business plans and then ... nothing. Practically empty aircraft flying to places no one wants to go. Or else, some guy you never heard of making heaps of moolah with a Central Bank contract. It's just weird!
The hatchet squads have been busy at both Lagos and Port with demolishing various BAC 1-11s and a 707 that had become mouldy blots upon the landscape. So we should soon see aviation-grade aluminium sauce pans hit the local markets.