PNoy inspects NAIA 1 a day after ‘ceiling’ accident

(Updated 9:38 p.m.) President Benigno Aquino III on Wednesday inspected the Ninoy Aquino International Airport (NAIA), a day after portions of the plastering — ceiling in earlier reports — at Terminal 1 collapsed and injured two airport employees. Aquino went to NAIA Terminal 3 at about 2 p.m. after having lunch at Villamor Airbase. He just came from Davao City where he attended the 104th annual convention of the Philippine Medical Association. After inspecting Terminal 3, Aquino proceeded to Terminal 1. The inspection ended around 4:30 in the afternoon. The NAIA, the gateway to the Philippines, has been judged by the website The Guide to Sleeping in Airports as Asia’s worst airport and one of the worst in the world for 2010.
With the President were Finance Secretary Cesar Purisima, Transportation Secretary Jose de Jesus, Manila International Airport Authority general manager Angel Honrado, and Public Works Secretary Rogelio Singson. "He dropped by to see for himself what really happened yesterday as far as the reports that a ceiling collapsed," Honrado said in an interview aired over GMA News' "24 Oras." He clarified that it was not the ceiling that collapsed as earlier reported, but the plastering. The TV report said Aquino, after the inspection, ordered the fasttracking of the construction of Terminal 3 so that it can be fully operational. Before dawn Tuesday, security guard Flordeliza Tayson and lift operator Rommel Reyes were injured when chunks of concrete fell from the ceiling of Terminal 1. Around 3 p.m. on the same day, a portion of the ceiling near Bay 7 of Terminal 1 also collapsed. No one was hurt in that incident. — Amita O. Legaspi/KBK, GMA News