By Fred Chukwuelobe
The nation’s and West Africa’s largest airlines, Air Peace Airlines, can thump its chest and claim the bragging rights for rising to great heights when managing passengers’ unruly behaviours and avoiding physical confrontation between its crews and angry passengers. The airline has faced multiple unruly passengers’ incidents but at no time did its crews take laws into their hands to deal with the situation. Instead, the crews responded to such incidents with utmost caution and professionalism, and in line with international aviation standards to which Nigeria is a signatory. I state this as a fact and unequivocally.
Let’s take a perfunctory look at these incidents to place in proper perspective Air Peace Airlines crew’s professionalism in dealing with the situations.
Before the incident involving Value Jet Airlines and popular musician known as Kwam 1, there had been multiple incidents involving passengers on Air Peace Airline flights both on ground and in the air, which neither escalated nor come to public attention because of the professional way the crews handled the matter.
The case of three passengers who were alleged to have drank three bottles of liquid suspected to be alcohol mid air on a London Gatwick – Lagos Air Peace flight on April 12, 2025 is the most serious. The passengers became intoxicated and threatened to storm the cockpit and force the plane down. They left their Economy Class seats and forcefully took over three Business Class seats. Despite repeated appeals from the captain, the three continued to cause chaos, putting the lives of passengers, the crew, and the equipment in clear danger. The pilot was forced to radio security in Lagos informing them of the incident. The Air Peace crew handled the situation with utmost calmness and professionalism it deserves, preferring to report the incident to security agencies and the regulatory agency, leaving them to handle the irate passengers. There was no physical confrontation between the drunken passengers and Air Peace Airlines crew.
Although upon landing, the unruly and drunken passengers were left off the hook by the agencies with no consequences, the manner the captain of that particular flight and his crew handled the disturbance prevented the situation from escalating and snowballing into a wider problem reminiscent of the Value Jet and the Ibom Air cases.
Another incident worthy of note is that of the senator representing Edo North and former governor of Edo State, Adams Aliyu Oshiomhole. He physically stopped Air Peace Airlines staff at the MMA2 Ikeja from carrying out their legitimate duties because he was not allowed to board an aircraft that had departed. The senator came late after the check-in counter had closed, claimed he checked in online, but couldn’t produce a genuine boarding pass to that effect. He jumped on the conveyor belt, physically blocking the entrance to the airport, and prevented passengers from entering the terminal. While all these were happening, Air Peace staff on duty maintained their composure. They neither confronted the unruly passenger nor did they exchange words with him.
There have also been so many other cases of passengers blocking air peace flights in the manner of Kwam 1. In each instance, the pilots didn’t start the engines to prevent the jet engines sucking up the unruly passengers who stood in front of the aircraft.
There was also another case of a lady who blocked an aircraft’s door, insisting that it would not depart, and vowing that her lawyer husband would take air peace to court if anything happened to her. She was aggrieved her flight was delayed and took matters into her hands.
Yet, another incident involved a Malaysia returnee who stood up from his seat in the Economy Class and dashed to the Business Class the moment a flight took off from Lagos on the way to Chinua Achebe Airport, Umueri, Anambra. He refused all entreaties from the crew to return to his seat in the economy. This fellow could have been swept off his feet and possibly hit his head on the ground by the force of the departing jet. He fought the crew, calling the pursar “a prostitute” and later fought the civil defence officers called by the captain in the absence of police presence at Anambra airport. It took the intervention of the Anambra State Governor, Prof. Charles Soludo, before the culprit was arrested by a police team which raced down from Awka, the state capital on the instructions of the State Commissioner of Police. In all these, Air Peace Airlines crew maintained their composure and prevented any escalation of the situation.
Similar passengers’ disturbances had happened in some other Air Peace Airlines flights and the professional way the crews handled them prevented the escalation of the incidents. That was why the public didn’t know about them. The only thing that happened was that Air Peace subsequent operations on those dates were delayed and the company lost revenue.
It is incontrovertible that, going by the training Air Peace Airlines crews routinely receive, they would have handled the Ibom Air situation better. There’s no way the crew would have resorted to dragging the irate passenger down the stairs of the aircraft and having her dress torn in the process and exposing her nudity.
In all the cases involving Air Peace Airlines crews, the matter was promptly reported to the security agencies and to the regulatory authorities – the NCAA. Unfortunately, the culprits were known to have received little or no reprimand from the aviation authorities. Many people did not know such incidents occurred much more learn about the punishments meted out to those concerned because the Air Peace crew handled them professionally. Even in a more serious situation like the three passengers who consumed alcohol at 36,000 feet above sea level and threatened to bring down an aircraft inflight, and despite the potential danger posed by the incident, the crew maintained their composure.
Air Peace crews did not receive any commendations for professionally conducting themselves and handling the situations in a manner that avoided escalation and possibly causing an affray, but they deserve to.
The flying public may not have noticed the Air Peace professionalism in those regards, and it is necessary to point them out because if the two incidents of Value Jet and Ibom Air had involved Air Peace flights, social media would have been on fire, literally speaking, with calls renting the air for the cancellation of the airlines AOC license.
On the score of their handling of the incidents, preventing an escalation, which invariably would have resulted in negative publicity for the nation’s struggling aviation industry, Air Peace Airlines crews deserve commendations.
NB: Fred Chukwuelobe, was a Special Assistant to former Governor of Anambra, Chris Ngige on Media and Publicity.
