Air Peace Management has strongly refuted the recent flight disruption report published by the Nigeria Civil Aviation Authority (NCAA) for August 2026.
Air Peace said the report contains fundamental data inaccuracies regarding its operational volume and mischaracterizes the root causes of flight delays, unfairly placing the blame on the airline.
Air Peace noted that the said data failed to reflect the reality of its operations, nor does it accurately contextualize the primary drivers of the operational disruptions experienced during the said month.
The airline said: “First and foremost, the NCAA report vastly underreported our total flight volume. Air Peace operated a total of 2,564 flights in August 2026, as opposed to the 1,864 flights stated in the NCAA report. By omitting over 700 fully operational flights from the data pool, the NCAA’s calculations skew our actual performance metrics and artificially inflate the reported delay percentages. Most worrisome is: Why did the NCAA start the monthly series with August rather than July, immediately following the publication of Q1 and Q2 on 31st of July?”
Air Peace stated further that “It is indeed worrisome that there is still no equivalent monthly data located for July, yet the NCAA published unusually granular August airline delay data only 13 days after month-end. Unbelievable!
It is reasonable to suggest that the early release of the August publication should have been accompanied by disclosure that the month contained an extraordinary aviation-sector industrial disruption which significantly affected the airline’s operations. The effect of the August 11th instigated Union disruptions of our operations lingered for over 14 days, leading to rescheduling, avoidable delays and cancellation of flights”.
The airline queried why was the report published rapidly without identifying the causes of the delays attributed to individual airlines instead of publishing wrong figures that could tarnish the reputation of the airline despite prevailing operational challenges
The airline noted that the characterization of these delays failed to differentiate between internal operational issues and severe systemic challenges that are completely outside the airline’s control.
Air Peace stated that an internal review of its August 2026 flight data performance analysis reveals that 391 flights, which is only 15% of the delays experienced during the month of August, were caused by internal factors, while the rest of the delays were caused by external factors, which it has the data to support it.
“From the above, only 391 flights should be attributed to Air Peace, which represents 15% of the delays in that month.
The internal delay causal factors were largely as a result of technical issues resulting in unscheduled maintenance on our aircraft and fuel-related issues. The major external disruptions are broken down as follows:
Airport Congestion and Traffic: Heavy tarmac and traffic congestion accounted for more than 51% of the external delays we experienced. Aircraft were frequently held on the ground or in holding patterns due to infrastructure capacity limits”, the airline said.
Bird Strikes: Air Peace explained that unpredictable wildlife hazards, specifically bird strikes during takeoff and landing, forced unscheduled aircraft inspections and safety checks, disrupting flight rotations.
According to the airline, “One of our aircraft, 5N-BYG, was struck by a bird in Abuja, which damaged the inlet cowl beyond acceptable limits, costing us USD1.8M to fix the dent. This is an aircraft that operates a minimum of eight sectors a day, airlifting about 1,000 passengers. Unfortunately, the aircraft was removed from flight operations for more than a week, resulting in huge disruptions, and only became serviceable after the inlet cowl was replaced”.
Airport Facilities: The airline pointed out that deficiencies and unexpected breakdowns in airport infrastructure heavily restricted seamless boarding and departure timelines.
Inclement Weather Conditions: Air Peace further explained that unfavourable weather patterns throughout August forced mandatory safety holds and several diversions, which further compounded the backlog.
The airline said it is no longer news that even now, “we are still in the rainy season. One flight diversion could result in almost three hours’ delay. How is the consequential delay Air Peace’s fault? Yet, we still take care of the passengers, including hotel accommodations, for external events that are beyond the airline. This is against industry standard”.
It emphasised that unprecedented Picketing of the Airline by Aviation Union members, created disruptions to its flight operations for over 14 days.
On the damage done to its Aircraft by Ground Handling Company, which resulted in the removal of the aircraft from active flights for more than 14 days, the airline stated that
the narrative again is that Air Peace is primarily responsible for these delays which is completely false.
Air Peace added that the majority of the delays experienced by its passengers were driven by external factors and completely outside of its control.
The airline maintained that: “In stark contrast, delays caused by internal operational factors accounted for just 15% of the total delays experienced during the month of August.
We have restrained ourselves from making these facts public before now, but we have now been pushed beyond acceptable limits, hence the need to go public and state the facts the way they are”.
Air Peace noted that it has heavily invested in its fleet, crew availability, continuous high-standard training and maintenance protocols, adding that it remain fully committed to safety, on-time performance and passenger satisfaction.
It observed that an airline cannot safely or logistically bypass severe airport congestion/traffic, inadequate airport infrastructure, sunset restrictions or adverse weather conditions, adding that it will continue to optimize its internal processes to mitigate against all the internal delay drivers.
Air Peace urged the Nigeria Civil Aviation Authority to review and audit its data collection methods to ensure future reports accurately reflect the correct data and delay causal factors/operational environment of the Nigerian aviation sector.
