尼日利亚首都设立禁飞区

The nearest functioning airport is 230km away
最近的运营机场在230公里以外

Nigeria imposes a no-fly zone on its own capital
尼日利亚首都设立禁飞区

Airlines and passengers are furious
怒气冲天

THE capital of Nigeria is a picture of order compared with Lagos, the chaotic commercial hub. But whereas Abuja’s sweeping avenues are well maintained, the runway of its airport is potholed. Several aircraft have damaged their landing gear on the rutted tarmac. Facing the risk of a serious crash, the government is closing the whole place for six weeks from March 8th. “The entire architecture of the runway, it has failed,” says the minister of aviation.

同混乱的商业中心拉各斯相比，尼日利亚的政治首都显得是一副秩序井然的画面。阿布贾清扫过的街道保持良好，但机场跑道坑坑洼洼。有些飞机在坑坑洼洼的跑道上毁坏了起落架。因面临严重撞机的风险，尼日利亚政府自3月8日起将对阿布贾整个机场关闭六周。民航部长说：“整个跑道结构已毁坏。”

The government hopes airlines will fly instead to Kaduna, a mere 230km (140 miles) north of Abuja, while the runway’s central portion is rebuilt, with other repairs taking six months in all. But a new terminal at Kaduna is still being built; right now it handles just 300 passengers a day, compared with 5,000 in Abuja. The foreign carriers that fly to the capital, including British Airways, Air France and Lufthansa, are queasy. “None of the European airlines will fly to Kaduna,” says an airline official.尼日利亚政府希望，航班改降阿布贾以北230公里外的卡杜纳。卡杜纳跑道的中央部分在重建之中，再加其他部位的整修要耗费6个月之久。而卡杜纳机场的一个新航站楼还在建设中，现在每天只受理300名乘客，而阿布贾机场可受理5000人。飞往首都阿布贾的外国航空公司（包括英国航空、法国航空、汉莎航空）对此感到不安。一位航空公司官员说：“这些欧洲航空公司不会飞往卡杜纳。”

Nigeria has a history of airport closures. In 2005 an Air France flight ploughed into a herd of cows on the runway at Port Harcourt, the country’s oil capital. Later that year a domestic flight crashed there, killing 108 people. The airport was shut for over a year in 2006-07. In 2015 it was voted the world’s worst by a travel website. Its arrivals terminal is a tent.尼日利亚有机场关闭的历史。2005年，法国航空公司的一架航班在哈科特港机场跑道冲入牛群。哈科特港是尼日利亚的石油之都。同年晚些时候，一架尼日利亚航班在那坠毁，造成108人丧生。哈科特港机场自2006年关闭了一年多。2015年，一家旅游网站投票将哈科特港机场评为全球最烂机场。行到终点站要住帐篷。

The current government, in power since 2015, is partly to blame for the sorry state of aviation. It has propped up the naira, leading to a shortage of hard currency and therefore of aviation fuel. That, plus the economy’s dip and the government’s unwillingness to let foreign firms repatriate their profits, has led many international airlines to cut routes or pull out of Nigeria entirely. Delays and cancellations are legion on domestic airlines. A private flag carrier, Arik Air, has asked passengers to stop attacking its staff. Diverting flights from Abuja to Kaduna won’t help.航班出现混乱状态部分归因于自2015以来上台的政府。尼日利亚力挺货币奈拉，导致硬通货缺乏，进而导致航空燃料短缺。尼日利亚经济陷入衰退，并不愿让外国企业将利润汇回国外，这导致许多国际航空公司减少航线或完全撤出尼日利亚。航班延误和取消屡见不鲜。私营承运公司Arik Air呼吁乘客停止攻击其工作人员。航班从阿布贾改降到卡杜纳将无济于事。

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