What's New In W. Africa (Nigeria)
Trogs.....nothing sinister....just enjoyed reading the Report and being unable to not compare it to some I have read issued by the AAIB in the UK.
it just reminded me of the validity of Nigeria being called "the land of the 90th percentile".
I actually shudder to think they have a thing called the Nigerian Space Administration (which I swear the Oso Gas Platform will be a part of one day when it goes into orbit)!
it just reminded me of the validity of Nigeria being called "the land of the 90th percentile".
I actually shudder to think they have a thing called the Nigerian Space Administration (which I swear the Oso Gas Platform will be a part of one day when it goes into orbit)!
Last edited by SASless; 30th Jul 2012 at 13:39.
I swear the Oso Gas Platform will be a part of one day when it goes into orbit
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Bristow in Nigeria
I have, as an ex- Bristow pilot from Nigeria, Mauritania and Somalia, tried to follow what is going on in Nigeria. I have lost track of Bristow's contracts there. I worked at Eket, Calabar and Warri. Can anybody bring me up to date? I also think I recognise former colleagues on this forum, such as SASless, 212man and NEO.
For those who have worked out who I am, I am still working and flying 212s in UK.
For those who have worked out who I am, I am still working and flying 212s in UK.
Twinpac - can't update you on the contracts but I have indeed worked out who you are!
I bumped into one of your fairly recent students here on 7 flight a few weeks ago (RJ.)
Cheers
I bumped into one of your fairly recent students here on 7 flight a few weeks ago (RJ.)
Cheers
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Twinpac,
Bristow still has 2 412s for Addax in Calabar and 1 at NAF Base. There are 4 flying for Exxon Mobil from Eket/QIT. There are rumours of the seventh going to Chevron.
They have 5 S76s flying for Agip from Agip Base and Osubi, 2 for Exxon Mobil from NAF and 1 from Lagos, plus 3 for Afren and part-time contracts from NAF as there's always one on a D check at the moment.
They have 2 ASA332Ls for ad-hoc, one in Lagos and one in NAF, plus 2 AS332L2s for Total in NAF.
There is also one S92 for Total in NAF and 2 for Chevron in Lagos.
PAAN is now a separate Nigerian company as Bristow sold its shares to the Nigerian shareholders. They still have 10 206/407 in Escravos and 3 412s in WT for Chevron, plus 1 407 in NAF. They also operate a Cessna 208 amphibian for Chevron, a Citation XLS for Chevron and one for Shell.
I hope I haven't missed anything.
Bristow still has 2 412s for Addax in Calabar and 1 at NAF Base. There are 4 flying for Exxon Mobil from Eket/QIT. There are rumours of the seventh going to Chevron.
They have 5 S76s flying for Agip from Agip Base and Osubi, 2 for Exxon Mobil from NAF and 1 from Lagos, plus 3 for Afren and part-time contracts from NAF as there's always one on a D check at the moment.
They have 2 ASA332Ls for ad-hoc, one in Lagos and one in NAF, plus 2 AS332L2s for Total in NAF.
There is also one S92 for Total in NAF and 2 for Chevron in Lagos.
PAAN is now a separate Nigerian company as Bristow sold its shares to the Nigerian shareholders. They still have 10 206/407 in Escravos and 3 412s in WT for Chevron, plus 1 407 in NAF. They also operate a Cessna 208 amphibian for Chevron, a Citation XLS for Chevron and one for Shell.
I hope I haven't missed anything.
I see they have become "Pirates" now instead of Terrorists, Guerilla Fighters, and Revolutionaries.
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allAfrica.com: Nigeria: The Trouble With Nigeria's Aviation Industry
So who paid the import duties on teh Caverton fleet for Shell?
interview
Lagos — The Managing Director, West African Business Unit, Bristow Helicopters, Mr. Akin Oni in this interview explains the issues crippling Nigeria's aviation industry and how the sector can be grown.
What drives Bristow Helicopters business?
Safety is the driver of our business. In the helicopter business, all parts move and there is always an opportunity for everything to go wrong. Hence, safety is something that we cannot play with, it is the driver of the business.
In the last six months we have been trying to reposition our business and focus on delivering superior value to our clients. Most of our customers are in the oil and gas and we have done a research among them to know how they would prefer we serve them. What came out of it is what we are implementing now under our value proposition - 'the client promise.' We are targeting zero accident, zero down time and zero complaints. The three of these mentioned formed part of 'the client promise' philosophy.
How does local content policy affects your business and aviation industry in Nigeria?
In our industry today, the Nigerian Content Act has changed things. We also report quarterly to the Nigerian content monitoring board since our operations are more in the oil and gas sector. The way that we have been addressing this in the past 26 years is getting Nigerians to take over the business.
The oil industry has been predominantly controlled by foreign entities and foreign companies. The only way we can change that is by growing Nigerians, train Nigerians, so we can replace and control the industry.
Bristow Helicopters have been training Nigerians for the past 26 years and we have continued to do that. I have a target of 2015 to substantially change and make sure that at least 90 percent of the people who work in our organisation are Nigerians. It would be Nigerian nationals at the technical, sub technical and at the management level. We would have Nigerian engineers, pilots and support staff.
We currently have six pilots undergoing helicopter training in Florida, the United States. In the next couple of weeks, another six would depart for the United States. They just came out of Zaria. We started an initiative with Zaria and we are committed to it in our Nigerian content drive and in our drive to build capacity in Nigeria.
Unfortunately Zaria still has not commenced helicopter training despite the promises. But we have engaged Zaria to train some of our helicopter cadets on fix wing. We have trained six in Zaria to the private pilot level. The six, including a lady will join the others in the United States for further training.
But the crisis in the north has affected our plan for the year, we had to move some people back to Lagos but they would go back to Zaria in September. In the next couple of weeks, we will commence recruiting some batch of Nigerian nationals to go for pilot and engineering training. We have about 45 students in Zaria, 10 have left but 35 are currently undergoing engineering training.
In the next selection process, we hope to take at least 20 for the engineering training and the same on the flying side. We are also discussing with Ilorin on using the school for flying training. But for now, the easiest way to train is the USA but we also have a responsibility to grow Nigerian companies hence our discussions with Ilorin and partnership with Zaria.
There is a huge manpower gap. In my organisation, even with the huge effort to train Nigerians, we still hire a lot of expatriates. My prayer daily is that the Petroleum Industry Bill (PIB) be passed because it comes with a lot of opportunities.
What is your training budget?
Last year my training budget was $4.7 million. This year it has increase substantially, I can't remember exactly. But each of the pilots we train in the United States cost us $250,000. Six would cost us $1.5 million. The next six is yet another $1.5 million. Some other huge cost goes into retraining pilots already in the system. If we sum that, we are looking at between $6 million to $7 million in training budget in 2012 for pilots alone. We haven't added engineering. That is why I get extremely sensitive and angry when they are poached. Training is a responsibility that our competitors should also imbibe.
There has been concern about import duties on aircraft/spare parts. How does it affect the aviation industry?
If you import an aircraft say for $29 million, approximately $30 million. The import duty for that aircraft is about 14 percent and that is about $4 million on import duties. That is why a lot of Nigerians cannot go into this business. The high import duties is preventing the entrepreneurs from coming into this business. Nigeria is among the few countries imposing import duties on aircraft. Duties were waved during Obasanjo's regime but it has been reintroduced. But it is bad for our economy. Somebody would have to do the right thing and remove the pressure on Nigerian airlines so they can compete with foreign airlines. Huge taxes and duties remain a burden. Covert $4 million into Naira and see how much it would amount. With that amount, I can put two hangers in Lagos and build maintenance facility.
Any plans to change your fleet?
In the past two years, we started fleet renewal and right now we are in the process of removing helicopters that we have used for a long time and replacing them with new generation aircraft.
In the last 3-4 years, we have virtually replaced our medium helicopters (they carry 12 people). The S92 fleet, the oldest would be about 4 years, the 412s are the older ones and we are about replacing them. An S92 cost about $29 million.
Where do you do your maintenance?
We do all our maintenance here in Nigeria. I studied engineering and I can tell that helicopters are far more difficult to maintain than fixed wings. We do right up to D-Checks in Nigeria. In terms of facilities, I can say, we are probably about the best for helicopter operations and light jets. We have the people, equipments and tools. We also have the necessary backings. We have a hangar for S92 in Lagos and we are building one in Port Harcourt. We have the capabilities. If we need to bring people into Nigeria to do certain things for us, we do that but we never take our aircraft out of Nigeria for maintenance.
What are the specific challenges with Nigeria's aviation sector?
We have been in Nigeria for 55 years. The biggest challenge we see in the aviation sector in Nigeria is infrastructure. Close to infrastructure is financing and huge manpower deficit. We have got to fix infrastructure. The state of infrastructure in Nigeria today is unacceptable. There is no reason for it. The next thing is financing. If you fix financing, you can substantially fix the infrastructure issues. But finance is not so much in the helicopter business because it is financed by the oil and gas sector but it is an issue in the fixed wings. I went to Tanzania last year, they don't have an all singing and dancing airport but it works. We are not asking for the latest and the greatest but let the basics be put in place and let them work. We can do it. We are talking about a maintenance hangar for Nigeria, has anyone asked where we would get the engineers from? We are struggling today looking for Nigerian engineers. We don't have engineers.
Lagos — The Managing Director, West African Business Unit, Bristow Helicopters, Mr. Akin Oni in this interview explains the issues crippling Nigeria's aviation industry and how the sector can be grown.
What drives Bristow Helicopters business?
Safety is the driver of our business. In the helicopter business, all parts move and there is always an opportunity for everything to go wrong. Hence, safety is something that we cannot play with, it is the driver of the business.
In the last six months we have been trying to reposition our business and focus on delivering superior value to our clients. Most of our customers are in the oil and gas and we have done a research among them to know how they would prefer we serve them. What came out of it is what we are implementing now under our value proposition - 'the client promise.' We are targeting zero accident, zero down time and zero complaints. The three of these mentioned formed part of 'the client promise' philosophy.
How does local content policy affects your business and aviation industry in Nigeria?
In our industry today, the Nigerian Content Act has changed things. We also report quarterly to the Nigerian content monitoring board since our operations are more in the oil and gas sector. The way that we have been addressing this in the past 26 years is getting Nigerians to take over the business.
The oil industry has been predominantly controlled by foreign entities and foreign companies. The only way we can change that is by growing Nigerians, train Nigerians, so we can replace and control the industry.
Bristow Helicopters have been training Nigerians for the past 26 years and we have continued to do that. I have a target of 2015 to substantially change and make sure that at least 90 percent of the people who work in our organisation are Nigerians. It would be Nigerian nationals at the technical, sub technical and at the management level. We would have Nigerian engineers, pilots and support staff.
We currently have six pilots undergoing helicopter training in Florida, the United States. In the next couple of weeks, another six would depart for the United States. They just came out of Zaria. We started an initiative with Zaria and we are committed to it in our Nigerian content drive and in our drive to build capacity in Nigeria.
Unfortunately Zaria still has not commenced helicopter training despite the promises. But we have engaged Zaria to train some of our helicopter cadets on fix wing. We have trained six in Zaria to the private pilot level. The six, including a lady will join the others in the United States for further training.
But the crisis in the north has affected our plan for the year, we had to move some people back to Lagos but they would go back to Zaria in September. In the next couple of weeks, we will commence recruiting some batch of Nigerian nationals to go for pilot and engineering training. We have about 45 students in Zaria, 10 have left but 35 are currently undergoing engineering training.
In the next selection process, we hope to take at least 20 for the engineering training and the same on the flying side. We are also discussing with Ilorin on using the school for flying training. But for now, the easiest way to train is the USA but we also have a responsibility to grow Nigerian companies hence our discussions with Ilorin and partnership with Zaria.
There is a huge manpower gap. In my organisation, even with the huge effort to train Nigerians, we still hire a lot of expatriates. My prayer daily is that the Petroleum Industry Bill (PIB) be passed because it comes with a lot of opportunities.
What is your training budget?
Last year my training budget was $4.7 million. This year it has increase substantially, I can't remember exactly. But each of the pilots we train in the United States cost us $250,000. Six would cost us $1.5 million. The next six is yet another $1.5 million. Some other huge cost goes into retraining pilots already in the system. If we sum that, we are looking at between $6 million to $7 million in training budget in 2012 for pilots alone. We haven't added engineering. That is why I get extremely sensitive and angry when they are poached. Training is a responsibility that our competitors should also imbibe.
There has been concern about import duties on aircraft/spare parts. How does it affect the aviation industry?
If you import an aircraft say for $29 million, approximately $30 million. The import duty for that aircraft is about 14 percent and that is about $4 million on import duties. That is why a lot of Nigerians cannot go into this business. The high import duties is preventing the entrepreneurs from coming into this business. Nigeria is among the few countries imposing import duties on aircraft. Duties were waved during Obasanjo's regime but it has been reintroduced. But it is bad for our economy. Somebody would have to do the right thing and remove the pressure on Nigerian airlines so they can compete with foreign airlines. Huge taxes and duties remain a burden. Covert $4 million into Naira and see how much it would amount. With that amount, I can put two hangers in Lagos and build maintenance facility.
Any plans to change your fleet?
In the past two years, we started fleet renewal and right now we are in the process of removing helicopters that we have used for a long time and replacing them with new generation aircraft.
In the last 3-4 years, we have virtually replaced our medium helicopters (they carry 12 people). The S92 fleet, the oldest would be about 4 years, the 412s are the older ones and we are about replacing them. An S92 cost about $29 million.
Where do you do your maintenance?
We do all our maintenance here in Nigeria. I studied engineering and I can tell that helicopters are far more difficult to maintain than fixed wings. We do right up to D-Checks in Nigeria. In terms of facilities, I can say, we are probably about the best for helicopter operations and light jets. We have the people, equipments and tools. We also have the necessary backings. We have a hangar for S92 in Lagos and we are building one in Port Harcourt. We have the capabilities. If we need to bring people into Nigeria to do certain things for us, we do that but we never take our aircraft out of Nigeria for maintenance.
What are the specific challenges with Nigeria's aviation sector?
We have been in Nigeria for 55 years. The biggest challenge we see in the aviation sector in Nigeria is infrastructure. Close to infrastructure is financing and huge manpower deficit. We have got to fix infrastructure. The state of infrastructure in Nigeria today is unacceptable. There is no reason for it. The next thing is financing. If you fix financing, you can substantially fix the infrastructure issues. But finance is not so much in the helicopter business because it is financed by the oil and gas sector but it is an issue in the fixed wings. I went to Tanzania last year, they don't have an all singing and dancing airport but it works. We are not asking for the latest and the greatest but let the basics be put in place and let them work. We can do it. We are talking about a maintenance hangar for Nigeria, has anyone asked where we would get the engineers from? We are struggling today looking for Nigerian engineers. We don't have engineers.
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Good News
Shell, Caverton Helicopters lauded on Nigerian Content developmentAugust 13, 2012 by Agency Reporter 6 Comments
Regulators and other stakeholders in both the oil and gas and the aviation sectors have commended Shell Petroleum Development Company and Caverton Helicopters on their strong commitments to indigenous manpower and capacity development in fulfilment of the objectives of the Nigerian Content Development Act.
This commendation was given on Thursday last week at the Business Performance Review of the five-year contract awarded in 2010 by Shell to Caverton Helicopters/Dancopter for the provision of aviation support services.
Won after a competitive bidding process, the contract is the biggest ever awarded by the oil multinational to an indigenous company and is seen as a major milestone in a field previously dominated by foreign companies.
According to a statement, the meeting was held primarily to review the performance of the contract as indicated in the contract documents, but it ended not only with praises for both partners but with a strong vote of confidence in the Nigerian Content Development Act, a legislation designed to aid the development of indigenous capacities in the oil and gas sector of the economy.
The consensus among stakeholders at the meeting, which was held at Sheraton Hotel in Lagos, was that the Shell/Caverton Helicopters’ partnership was an early proof of the workability and gains of the Nigerian Content development initiative of the Federal Government.
The Executive Secretary, the Nigerian Content Development and Monitoring Board, Mr Ernest Nwapa, who was represented by Mr. David Adeyeye, lauded Shell for taking local content development seriously and for taking the lead in this area. He also commended Caverton Helicopters for making a bold statement on behalf of indigenous companies. “Caverton Helicopters has demonstrated that, as a nation, we can succeed if we are serious about capacity building and that the opportunity and potential to grow and do more is there,” he said.
On its part, the Nigerian Civil Aviation Authority also extolled Shell and Caverton Helicopters for partnering effectively for Nigerian Content development in such a strategic sector. The Nigerian Civil Aviation Authority’s representative at the event, Mr. Mike Uwaifo, particularly noted that the stride of Caverton Helicopters had been “surprising and heart-warming,’ adding that “the steady growth and progress of the company must be appreciated.”
Dear Mr Akin Oni,
Really?
"Safety is the driver of our business. In the helicopter business, all parts move and there is always an opportunity for everything to go wrong."
Oh dear
Really?
"Safety is the driver of our business. In the helicopter business, all parts move and there is always an opportunity for everything to go wrong."
Oh dear
Last edited by griffothefog; 14th Aug 2012 at 05:46.
Griffo....one must stick to that Industry myth if one wishes to move up the greasy pole of Management!
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Bristow in Nigeria seems determined to lose more expat pilots even though they're already short. Earlier in the year, in a move they claimed was to get a better service, they changed their medical insurance from AXA/PPP which most guys were pretty happy with, to Aetna which is garbage (just read some of the reviews - Aetna Reviews).
Unlike most other Bristow locations in the world (probably because they don't have unions for the expats, unlike most other countries), the pilots in Nigeria are supposed to fill in some kind rinky-dink annual performance appraisal which most guys (and girls) either knew nothing about or didn't fill in, so they'll probably get no raise. People are already seeing new hires brought in on higher pay then existing pilots (do they think we pilots don't talk to each other about pay or something
)
Some pilots use to complain about the journey to work in Port Harcourt , but really liked the housing there (which is probably the best in Nigeria) so now the company is moving us into some kind of cheap housing (sorry, housing closer to work) which looks like it'll be same standard as the garbage in Lagos. One of the new places has been empty for years and I hear tell it's got mold and stuff all over the walls, and the other place they already moved us to has real expensive food, lousy internet, just a few lousy TV channels which are near unwatchable and some kind of local manager who couldn't manage a Krispy Kreme franchise on a slow day at a dieter's convention
Looks like CHC will get plenty choice when they get their AOC and bring in all those new birds they're talking about
Unlike most other Bristow locations in the world (probably because they don't have unions for the expats, unlike most other countries), the pilots in Nigeria are supposed to fill in some kind rinky-dink annual performance appraisal which most guys (and girls) either knew nothing about or didn't fill in, so they'll probably get no raise. People are already seeing new hires brought in on higher pay then existing pilots (do they think we pilots don't talk to each other about pay or something
) Some pilots use to complain about the journey to work in Port Harcourt , but really liked the housing there (which is probably the best in Nigeria) so now the company is moving us into some kind of cheap housing (sorry, housing closer to work) which looks like it'll be same standard as the garbage in Lagos. One of the new places has been empty for years and I hear tell it's got mold and stuff all over the walls, and the other place they already moved us to has real expensive food, lousy internet, just a few lousy TV channels which are near unwatchable and some kind of local manager who couldn't manage a Krispy Kreme franchise on a slow day at a dieter's convention
Looks like CHC will get plenty choice when they get their AOC and bring in all those new birds they're talking about
Bristow doing it on the cheap? Tell me it ain't so!
Last edited by SASless; 12th Sep 2012 at 21:17.
And what birds are CHC talking about bringing In ?