A Professor of Chemistry in the Ahmadu Bello University (ABU), Zaria, Professor Joseph Lori, is right now in prison custody in the United Kingdom after he was apprehended at the Manchester Airport with some chemicals which were later confirmed to be dangerous.

According to The Sun Newspaper of London, in its August 2, 2010 edition, the Chemistry Professor sneaked the flammable liquids in his baggage, without declaring it to check-in staff, on board a KLM plane before being apprehended at the Manchester Airport.

A potential disaster was said to have been averted when handlers of luggage noticed a strange smell coming from Professor Lori’s suitcase and the handlers alerted their bosses. After the report of the airport’s luggage-handlers, security staff at the airport immediately launched a major chemical alert.

Because of the danger which the chemical posed, baggage handlers who came into contact with the substance were rushed to hospital in contamination suits.

The Sun reported that when Professor Lori was identified as the owner of the bag, he was dragged off the KLM flight by policemen, as 150 passengers looked on.

Firemen wearing special protective suits were called in to search his luggage and discovered three bottles containing chemicals phosphorus oxychloride, ethylamine and ethyl acetoacetate with t-shirts around them.

It was learnt that Professor Lori was exposed because the seal around the bottle containing one of the chemicals, ethylamine, had broken in his bag and was giving off a red fluid, a puff of smoke and harmful vapours.

When quizzed by cops at Manchester Airport, the 49-year-old professor said: “I’m a chemist. I have chemicals, they are not dangerous.”

The father-of-three said he had bought the chemicals legally in the UK and was taking them back to his native Nigeria to give to his students.

When paraded at the Minshull Street Crown Court in Manchester for trial, the prosecuting police officer, Ms Wendy Logan, told the court that the chemicals would have posed “a significant risk of ignition” on the flight.

According to chemical experts and aviation regulations, ethylamine, one of the chemicals found in Professor Lori’s bag, is forbidden on aircraft as it is extremely flammable with the same qualities as petrol, while phosphorous oxychloride is both toxic and an irritant.

Professor Lori who resides in Cheetham Hill, Manchester, pleaded guilty to one count charge of recklessly endangering an aircraft. The Minshull Street Crown Court in Manchester under Judge Angela Nield handed the Professor a suspended six-month jail term.

While delivering the court verdict, Judge Nield said; “You are a professor of chemistry and clearly a man who is extremely knowledgeable in his own field.

“The potential consequences of your actions could have been catastrophic and you should have known that.”

A check by our correspondent at the ABU indicates that Professor Joseph Lori had sought and obtained approval for a two-year secondment-leave at Rivers State.

Impeccable sources contacted by Sunday Trust at the university expressed shock and surprise about the involvement of Professor Lori in such a scandal as records at the University show that the Professor is serving a two-year secondment-leave in Rivers State.

Some colleagues of the Professor who spoke to Sunday Trust yesterday confirmed that the Professor had left for a two-year secondment leave.

“We learnt that authorities of the United Kingdom have written the university trying to confirm the position of the Professor at the university. The university has replied, confirming that he is their Professor but has left for secondment-leave in Rivers State, therefore the university is not aware about his residing in the United Kingdom,” one of Professor Lori’s colleagues, who didn’t want to be named because he was not authorised to talk to journalists, told Sunday Trust at the university’s old Pharmaceutical Sciences block.

When contacted, the Protocol and Information Officer of the University, Mr Bitrus Galmaka, said his office was not intimated about the incident, saying that it was the Security Unit that should have such information.

However, all efforts to get the University’s Chief Security Officer at his office and on phone proved abortive as of time going to press

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