Airline

Ghana Transport minister plays down aircraft crash at main airport

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Ghana Transport minister plays down aircraft crash at main airport

The fact that two aircraft tipped at the wings at Kotoka International Airport in Ghana has been played down by the country’s transport ministry. Deputy transport minister Dzifa Ativor called the event an “incident” rather than a crash.

The official reports says Lufthansa Flight 567 and Turkish Airlines Flight 624 tipped at the wings on the tarmac as the latter prepared to taxi for takeoff.

Ativor played denied the suggestion that the accident could have been the result of overcrowding. "The Ghana Civil Aviation Authority has set up investigations and they will be submitting a report to the ministry as early as possible,” she said. “After that we will forward it to the accident investigation board to do an in-depth investigation so that we'll take steps to forestall recurrence of such incidents."

The Turkish Airline aircraft was temporarily grounded but has since arrived safely at its destination, and the Lufthansa flight was also suspended until the following day.

"Our aircraft was in the parking position when the aircraft from Turkish Airlines which was taxing to the runway hit the winglet of our aircraft," says Yannick Aplogan, Turkish Airline's manager for Ghana. "Based on our internal processes we decided to cancel the flight to make further technical checks.