The man's body was found on Friday in an undercarriage wheel compartment after the Airbus A340-500 plane returned to Lagos from London, said Arik spokesman Adebanji Ola, but it was unclear when or how he gained access to it.

"They just found the body in the aircraft yesterday. There's no identity on it," he told AFP, adding an investigation would be carried out.

Previous such cases have seen stowaways hide inside planes' wheel wells in Nigeria or other countries in hopes of making it abroad. They have previously frozen to death or been crushed by the wheel.

In September, a suspected stowaway found dead on a London street was believed to have fallen from the undercarriage of an incoming flight to Heathrow Airport.

The man, who police believed was African and aged between 20 and 30, was discovered in the suburb of Mortlake.

That discovery came just over two weeks after another suspected stowaway was found dead on board a British Airways flight that landed at Heathrow from Cape Town. The body of the unidentified man was found in the landing gear bay of a Boeing 747, British Airways said.