Face of Africa model in plane crash scare
Written by By Toivo Ndjebela
Thursday, 02 October 2008
AVIATION authorities are probing Face of Africa 2008 finalist and trainee pilot, Maria Hiwilepo, after losing her bearings mid-flight and initiating a rescue mission which ended in her being escorted to land with just 12 minutes of fuel remaining.
No one was injured as a result of the drama that took place last week Wednesday, when Hiwilepo and an unidentified co-pilot became confused as to the whereabouts of Windhoek’s Eros Airport, which resulted in an emergency intervention by aviation authorities to locate the lost beauty queen and her colleague.
Director of Aircraft Accidents Investigation, Erickson Nengola confirmed to Informanté that his department had launched an investigation into the matter. “It’s true that the incident occurred,” he said.
“We are now investigating whether the cause was due to a human factor, the style of their school’s management, quality of classes offered or a misunderstanding between the two co-pilots,” Nengola said.
Hiwilepo, a multiple Miss Namibia competitor and former Miss Radio Energy, was en route from Ondangwa to Windhoek’s Eros Airport as part of her flying lessons.
Sources say that on her way back to the capital, Hiwilepo made a stopover in Tsumeb where she spent several hours before continuing her journey to Windhoek later in the evening.
On their way back, Hiwilepo, who is not accustomed to flying solo, allegedly lost sight of the route to Windhoek, instead flying her plane in the direction of Gobabis. Sources attributed the mishap to an alleged lack of geographical savvy, required to navigate the plane to her intended destination.
After hours awaiting Hiwilepo’s arrival, Windhoek based aviation authorities, particularly her instructors at the Namibia Aviation Training Academy (NATA), grew increasingly concerned about Hiwilepo and her co-pilot’s delay. Sources say signals were not lost, but that several attempts to direct Hiwilepo to Windhoek were unsuccessful as the model continued to fly in an easterly direction. In their desperate attempt to rescue the trainee pilots, the aviation personnel instructed ambulance crew to turn on their emergency lights to help the pair determine the direction of their destination.
Their initial attempts proved unsuccessful and an immediate decision was taken to send another plane in to direct the trainee pilots to the airport via a two-way, sources in the Ministry of Works said.
Lady luck seemed to be on the trainees’ side however, as they were left with only 12 minutes of fuel by the time they touched down in Windhoek, sources said.
Sources said that had the plane run out of fuel, it would probably have joined the list of nine other aircrafts that have crashed in Namibia over the past nine months, further faltering the country’s aviation safety record.
Hiwilepo’s mid-flight mishap contradicts claims made by the beauty queen last week that she is a ‘professional pilot’. Aviation experts say the incident serves a blow to the former Polytechnic of Namibia, IT student’s ambitions to acquire a commercial pilot licence.
Hiwilepo currently holds a basic Personal Private Licence (PPL).
Contacted for comment, Hiwilepo tried to quash allegations that she was one of the pilots. “Please don’t put my name in the newspaper. It was a mistake.” Asked whether by ‘mistake’ she was referring to the incident or the identification of the pilots, she answered “the latter”, before dropping the call.