'Animals hindered Mweya Safari Lodge plane from safe landing' – Monitor
Prime
The wreckage of the plane that crashed at Mweya Safari Lodge in Queen Elizabeth National Park in Kasese District last Saturday. Photo | Fiile
By Alex Ashaba
New details have emerged about a plane that crashed at Mweya Safari Lodge in Queen Elizabeth National Park in Kasese District last Saturday.
The Monitor established yesterday that game rangers had not cleared the airstrip for the aircraft’s safe landing.
A source at Mweya Safari Lodge, who requested not to be named to speak freely, said by landing time, wild animals were crowding the airstrip.
Some disappeared as the plane approached the runway but later regrouped, obstructing it from safe landing.
“Being a national park, our airstrip is always full of animals from the park. Whenever the plane is about to land, we first clear the airstrip to ensure there are no animals. I think there was no clear communication by the time the plane was about to land,” the source said.
He said the pilot made several attempts to land but was prevented by the marauding animals.
“He was then forced to land atop one of our staff houses, which collapsed. Good enough, our staff member who is a health worker, had just moved out. The house acts as our medical treatment unit,” the source said.
He added that the plane had six people on board including three tourists who were staying at the lodge while the other three included a pilot, co-pilot and a first aid staff.
The plane belonged to BAR Aviation.
When contacted, the Uganda Wildlife Authority (UWA) spokesperson, Mr Bashir Hangi, said he could not ascertain the cause of the crash.
He said after failing to land safely, the pilot rammed into one of the buildings of Mweya Safari Lodge, adding that the pilot was injured in the crash.
“Our staff were also alerted and appeared with fire extinguishers after detecting some smoke coming out but it was contained. Three passengers were later taken to Mweya Safari Lodge,” he said.
In a press statement, BAR Aviation management said: “The aircraft had a mishap on the runway as it landed at Mweya airfield in Queen Elizabeth National Park on Saturday 31 at 1:15pm. All passengers and crew are safe and there are no casualties.”
It added that their flight operations continued normally as investigations continue to ascertain the cause of the crash.
In September last year, an Mi-24 helicopter crashed into a mud and wattle house a few metres away from Saaka airfield in Kabarole District.
The UPDF helicopter from Ssaka Airfield was heading to the Democratic Republic of Congo and had two people; a pilot and co-pilot.
[email protected]
We come to you. We are always looking for ways to improve our stories. Let us know what you liked and what we can improve on.
Mr Richard Lutaaya, who lost his son following the crowd surge on New Year’s Eve, says he saw “about 10 bodies piled together” yesterday after the mortuary attendants had initially told him the…
The attacks, which occured between July and September, claimed 28 lives and left several others with injuries. The attacks brought back ugly memories of similar attacks between 2017 and 2018…
A Tutsi-led group, the M23 has conquered swathes of territory in the DR Congo's North Kivu province in recent months and advanced towards its capital Goma
If you have an Ad-blocker please disable it and reload the page or try again later.
Welcome!
