The International Air Transport Association (IATA), in conjunction with other stakeholders in the aviation sector, has launched the African and Indian Ocean Islands Safety Enhancement Team (ASET) to be based in Nairobi, Kenya to coordinate air safety matters amid growing concerns on air safety in  the continent.

ASET's objective is to help Africa achieve international air safety levels and hopes to reduce the continents' civil aviation accidents by half by the year 2010. According to IATA regional director for Africa Peter Chikumba, ASET has been set up to arrest a growing crisis in Africa's civil aviation.

The initiative is supported by aircraft manufacturers Airbus and Boeing, the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICA0), the US Federal Aviation Authority (FAA), the Nairobi-based African Airlines' Association (AFRAA), and similar African Aviation groups.

By bringing all the stakeholders together, including African airlines, airport authorities and governments, IATA is hoping for a 50 percent reduction in civil aviation accidents within seven years. The association is also in the process of upgrading pilots and other airline official's training to improve air safety.  About 400 passengers died in civil aviation accidents in Africa in 2003, accounting nearly 50 percent of the world's civil aviation related deaths in a year that stands out as the continents worst in aviation history.

Not included in this figure is the number of civilians and military personnel who perished in military air accidents last year, such as those who were flung to their deaths after the cargo door of a military plane opened soon after take -off the Democratic Republic of Congo last year.

This year, the situation is the same, with the death of 135 passengers and six crew members aboard an Egyptian Boeing 737-200 airliner operated by Flash Airlines which crashed into the Red Sea soon after take off from the holiday resort of Sham el-Sheikh early in January 2004.

A crash in Benin on Christmas Day last year, in which a charter airline, Union Des Transports Africans of Guinea and Lebanon crashed into the Atlantic sea, killing at least 140 out of 161 passengers, and the Egypt accident shocked the global aviation industry.

Two years ago, Africa's civil aviation traffic accounted for 3 percent of world traffic. But the average number of air accidents from the continent contributed a quarter of the global total, accounting for ten percent of fatalities. But last year was exceptional in the number of aviation-related deaths.

In January, six passengers died when a civil aviation Antonov plane crashed in Libreville, Gabon. Two months later, an Air Algeria Boeing 727-200 crashed in Algeria, claiming 106 lives. And in Namibia, four passengers died in June when a Cessna ambulance charter crashed into a mountain.

Kenya had its fair share of accidents too. An African Commuter Services 'Gulfstream crashed at  Busia airstrip on the Kenya-Uganda border on January24, 2002, killing  two pilots and the countries' cabinet minister for labor, Mr. Ahmed Khalif.

 The aircraft, which also injured several other cabinet ministers and members of parliament, had been chartered to ferry dignitaries to a celebration party for the then recently appointed home affairs minister, Moody Awori. Mr. Awori is now the nation's vice president.

 Later in July 2003,  a South African Fairchild aircraft crashed into Mount Kenya, killing two pilots and a family of 14 US tourists on board.

 In neighboring war-torn Sudan, there were also several air accidents and incidents in 2003. In July, a Sudan Airways' Boeing 737-200 crashed killing 116 people on board. Later in November, an Antonov cargo plane killed

13 people in yet another civil aviation accident.

 Why is Africa so prone to air accidents? The causes of most these accidents are yet to be made officially public.  Out of 25 civil aviation accidents in Africa last year, only Namibia had by end January 2004 released a report; it blamed pilot error for the Cessna ambulance accident  that killed 4 people in June 2003.

 Most governments in Africa are either too slow and incompetent or reluctant to release air accident investigation reports. But ultimately, a poor state of infrastructure- airstrips, runways, broken down communications equipment such as air navigation aids, and corruption in issuance of air operators licenses is responsible for the accident's high rate of air crashes.

 In Kenya, transport and communications minister John Michuki  is still hesitating to release a report on a public enquiry into the January 24 BusiaAir air charter accident that killed his cabinet colleague, labor minister Ahmed Khalif. The transport minister had himself appointed the commission of enquiry into the accident into the accident a few days after the crash.

 It was headed by one of Kenya's best known lawyers, Lee Muthoga. Press reports have quoted the report as being extremely critical of the country's directorate of civil aviation (now renamed the Kenya Civil Aviation Authority). It recommends a complete over-haul of KCAA, accusing it of ineptitude and inefficiency that is a danger to the county's airspace.

  Poor pay for civil aviation staff compared with their European and American counterparts, and poor training, particularly in countries undergoing civil strife, also contribute to air crashes in the continent.

  So far, the continent has lacked the ability to mobilize both internal and external resources. Most civil aviation authorities are not yet autonomous from their mother ministries; revenue collections go to the national treasuries, leaving them cash strapped.

 But while suffering the highest haul rate per million departures globally, the continent has no data collection and analysis machinery to certain causes of accidents.

 With high domestic air traffic, Nigeria is accident prone. Early liberalization of the country's air sector saw an influx of operators who have compromised on safety, and civil aviation had been, until recently, slow in enforcing the law.

  Africa-wide, Mr. Chikumba of IATA blames charter and cargo in countries until recently under civil strife, such as Angola, Sudan, and the Democratic Republic of Congo for most of the continents' air incidents. Until recently, most of the aircraft involved are Russian made Antonovs and Ilyushins. Angola has banned the use of these aircraft and was largely accident free last year.

  With a secretariat at IATA's Nairobi office currently, ASET was launched on December 3 last year and is expected gather momentum in 2004.

 Globally, IATA has set a target of reducing by half the number of civil aviation accidents. Last year, $2.5 million was spent globally in organizing and updating training programs in air safety.

By Christopher Mburu
eTN Kenya