After a two-month suspension due to the terrorist attack on Kaduna International Airport, a local airline, Azman Air, has resumed flights to Kaduna.
The airline landed around noon on Monday, much to the delight of airport stakeholders, passengers, and the airport authority.
The flight to Kaduna had been cancelled on March 28 after the airport was attacked by terrorists who invaded the runway. Flights were subsequently cancelled while the airline said the suspension was in order to re-evaluate security at the airport.
Other airlines also halted flights following the attack, which resulted in the death of a security guard assigned to the Nigerian Airspace Management Agency (NAMA). The Abuja-Kaduna train was attacked the next day, killing ten people and leaving 61 kidnapped victims in captivity.
However, passengers on the Kaduna route were given some relief when one of the airlines operating the route resumed flights.
Azman arrived at the airport around noon on Monday with 42 passengers, some of whom paid more than N100,000 for the flight from Abuja to Kaduna.
According to reports, the Abuja-Kaduna flight takes about 20 minutes, but many passengers paid more than N100,000 for a two-leg ticket from Abuja to Kaduna.
Although the airline did not fly directly to Kaduna, it did fly passengers to Lagos’ Murtala Muhammed Airport, where they connected with the Kaduna flight.
“This demonstrates how desperate people were to get to Kaduna despite the security challenges on the Abuja-Kaduna Road and the suspension of the Abuja-Kaduna Train Service”, a source said.
According to an Azman official who confirmed the flight’s resumption, the flight will be operated daily, with the next flight to Kaduna scheduled for today, Wednesday.
