Arik Air is a Nigerian airline operating mainly from two hubs at Murtala Muhammed International Airport in

Lagos Lagos (Nigerian English: ; ) is the largest city in Nigeria and the second most populous city in Africa, with a population of 15.4 million as of 2015 within the city proper. Lagos was the national capital of Nigeria until December 1991 fo ...

and

Nnamdi Azikiwe International Airport Nnamdi Azikiwe International Airport is an international airport serving Abuja, in the Federal Capital Territory of Nigeria. It is the main airport serving the Nigerian capital city and was named after Nigeria's first President, Nnamdi Azik ...

Abuja Abuja () is the capital and eighth most populous city of Nigeria. Situated at the centre of the country within the Federal Capital Territory (FCT), it is a planned city built mainly in the 1980s based on a master plan by International Plan ...

. Arik Air's head office is the ''Arik Air Aviation Center'' on the grounds of Murtala Muhammed International Airport in

Ikeja Ikeja is the capital city of Lagos State in southwestern Nigeria. Its population, as of the 2006 census, is 313,196. Prior to the emergence of military rule in the early 1980s, Ikeja was a well planned, clean and quiet residential and commerci ...

. Arik Air serves a network of regional and mid-haul destinations within

Africa Africa is the world's second-largest and second-most populous continent, after Asia in both cases. At about 30.3 million km2 (11.7 million square miles) including adjacent islands, it covers 6% of Earth's total surface area ...

History

Early years

The company was created in 2004 by Joseph Arumemi-Ikhide from the ashes of Nigeria Airways, which was liquidated in 2002. In August 2006, the Federal Ministry of Aviation granted Arik Air authorisation to fly to

Trinidad and Tobago Trinidad and Tobago (, ), officially the Republic of Trinidad and Tobago, is the southernmost island country in the Caribbean. Consisting of the main islands Trinidad and Tobago, and numerous much smaller islands, it is situated south of ...

and

Amsterdam Amsterdam ( , , , lit. ''The Dam on the River Amstel'') is the capital and most populous city of the Netherlands, with The Hague being the seat of government. It has a population of 907,976 within the city proper, 1,558,755 in the urban ar ...

, London and

Madrid Madrid ( , ) is the capital and most populous city of Spain. The city has almost 3.4 million inhabitants and a metropolitan area population of approximately 6.7 million. It is the second-largest city in the European Union (EU), and ...

in Europe. Furthermore, the airline then planned to fly to

Atlanta Atlanta ( ) is the capital and most populous city of the U.S. state of Georgia. It is the seat of Fulton County, the most populous county in Georgia, but its territory falls in both Fulton and DeKalb counties. With a population of 498,7 ...

, Miami, and

Houston Houston (; ) is the most populous city in Texas, the most populous city in the Southern United States, the fourth-most populous city in the United States, and the sixth-most populous city in North America, with a population of 2,304,580 ...

in the United States and

Birmingham Birmingham ( ) is a city and metropolitan borough in the metropolitan county of West Midlands in England. It is the second-largest city in the United Kingdom with a population of 1.145 million in the city proper, 2.92 million in the We ...

in the United Kingdom. On 4 April 2008, Arik Air was given permission to fly to the United States by the

US Department of Transportation The United States Department of Transportation (USDOT or DOT) is one of the executive departments of the U.S. federal government. It is headed by the secretary of transportation, who reports directly to the President of the United States a ...

. Arik Air started international operations to London-Heathrow on 15 December 2008, using an Airbus A340-500 aircraft wet-leased from Hi Fly. It added

Johannesburg Johannesburg ( , , ; Zulu language, Zulu and xh, eGoli ), colloquially known as Jozi, Joburg, or "The City of Gold", is the largest city in South Africa, classified as a Megacity#List of megacities, megacity, and is List of urban areas by p ...

on 1 June 2009,

New York JFK John F. Kennedy International Airport (colloquially referred to as JFK Airport, Kennedy Airport, New York-JFK, or simply JFK) is the main international airport serving New York City. The airport is the busiest of the seven airports in the New ...

on 30 November 2009, and

Dubai Dubai (, ; ar, wikt:دبي, دبي, translit=Dubayy, , ) is the List of cities in the United Arab Emirates#Major cities, most populous city in the United Arab Emirates (UAE) and the capital of the Emirate of Dubai, the most populated of the 7 ...

on 28 July 2014. Subsidiary airline Arik Niger (IATA code: Q9) commenced operations in April 2009, but was shut down in February 2010.

Development since 2010

Arik Air transported its 5 millionth passenger on 6 August 2010 and it transported its 10 millionth passenger on 18 September 2012, both on flights between Johannesburg and Lagos. On 20 September 2012, the airline cancelled all its domestic operations after aviation officials raided the airline's office in Lagos, Nigeria. Flights resumed on 23 September. Arik Air had placed an order for five

Boeing 777-300ER The Boeing 777, commonly referred to as the Triple Seven, is an American long-range wide-body airliner developed and manufactured by Boeing Commercial Airplanes. It is the world's largest twinjet. The 777 was designed to bridge the gap betw ...

aircraft, which was cancelled in 2011. Arik Air then placed an order for two Boeing 747-8I aircraft 2013. However, in early 2017, Arik Air converted the 747-8I orders to two Boeing 787-9 Dreamliners instead.Nigeria’s Arik Air switches Boeing 747-8s with 787-9s
accessed 28 January 2017 Arik Air had been the last remaining airline customer for the passenger 747-8 (who had not yet received any examples). The conversion of the 747-8 order to Dreamliners came shortly after the airline, owing to major financial stress and most aircraft not being operational, was taken over by the Asset Management Corporation of Nigeria (AMCON) at the start of 2017, deeming the airline as

too big to fail "Too big to fail" (TBTF) and "too big to jail" is a theory in banking and finance that asserts that certain corporations, particularly financial institutions, are so large and so interconnected that their failure would be disastrous to the great ...

. Since the takeover, all flights leaving Africa, along with flights to O.R. Tambo International Airport, have been gradually suspended. Simultaneously,

KPMG KPMG International Limited (or simply KPMG) is a multinational professional services network, and one of the Big Four accounting organizations. Headquartered in Amstelveen, Netherlands, although incorporated in London, England, KPMG is a net ...

was appointed by AMCON to conduct a forensic audit on Arik Air's books. Since then, AMCON is gradually in the process of reviving and stabilising the airline and its operations. Due to Arik Air's debt, the airline is projected to merge with Aero Contractors. It has also been revealed that this new airline merger is to be re-branded as Nigeria Eagle (styled as NG Eagle), with some of the aircraft already re-painted to represent the new livery. It is speculated by many to be another attempt to re-establish a

national airline A flag carrier is a transport company, such as an airline or shipping company, that, being locally registered in a given sovereign state, enjoys preferential rights or privileges accorded by the government for international operations. His ...

by AMCON, even though they have officially dissociated any relations with the plans; stating that they were going to make a start-up airline.

Destinations

Arik Air has built up a domestic network covering mainly Nigerian and several other Western African destinations. It previously also served more distant and intercontinental destinations in the

United Kingdom The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, commonly known as the United Kingdom (UK) or Britain, is a country in Europe, off the north-western coast of the continental mainland. It comprises England, Scotland, Wales and ...

and the

United States The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country Continental United States, primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 U.S. state, states, a Washington, D.C., ...

Fleet

Current fleet

As of November 2022, the Arik Air fleet consists of the following aircraft:

Former fleet

Arik Air previously operated the following aircraft: irfleets.net - Arik Air Fleetretrieved 26 June 2019

Incidents and accidents

* On 8 March 2018, the pilot of Arik Air flight W3 304 from

Accra Accra (; tw, Nkran; dag, Ankara; gaa, Ga or ''Gaga'') is the capital and largest city of Ghana, located on the southern coast at the Gulf of Guinea, which is part of the Atlantic Ocean. As of 2021 census, the Accra Metropolitan District, , ...

declared an emergency when an unknown source of smoke was detected in the cabin from their destination. The

Bombardier Dash 8 Q400 The De Havilland Canada DHC-8, commonly known as the Dash 8, is a series of turboprop-powered regional airliners, introduced by de Havilland Canada (DHC) in 1984. DHC was later bought by Boeing in 1988, then by Bombardier in 1992; then by ...

landed safely in

Ghana Ghana (; tw, Gaana, ee, Gana), officially the Republic of Ghana, is a country in West Africa. It abuts the Gulf of Guinea and the Atlantic Ocean to the south, sharing borders with Ivory Coast in the west, Burkina Faso in the north, and Tog ...

and no passenger or crew member was injured as a result of the incident.

References

External links

Official website
{{IATA members, africa Airlines of Nigeria Airlines established in 2006 Nigerian brands Abuja Companies based in Lagos Nigerian companies established in 2006