Water Heater Explodes
More bad news for Jomo Kenyatta International Airport
(eTN) - Only days after a failure of electricity supply and of all backup systems brought East Africa’s busiest international airport to a complete and utter halt for several hours, leading to flight delays galore, has the explosion of a water heater in the government VIP section of the airport caused more consternation among passengers and air operators. The water heater, probably – and this is speculation as of right now in the absence of hard technical evidence – may have been damaged by power fluctuations and the often experienced low-voltage periods, and when the thermostat failed, the water overheated and eventually cause the tank to explode due to overpressure.
One regular source was immediately available for comment and had this to say: "It is lucky for everyone that there were no casualties. It goes to show that KAA – the Kenya Airport Authority – has huge problems in maintaining our most important airport in the region and unless they pull up their socks we may find more such accident happening for lack of good preventive maintenance. They charge us airlines a lot of money, the airport expansion and rehabilitation is slow in progressing, the power backup failed last week again and caused all airlines losses through delays and now this. Maybe the time is right to bring professional airport management to Nairobi now and send the civil servants home."
Harsh words but understandably so, considering the endless petitions and requests made to the KAA by operators and most of the time to no avail.
Comments
Dear Kenyan engineers, where was the pressure relief valve, mandatory for each hot water boiler?
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