Freighters carry medical aid from China to Europe

[caption id="attachment_413539" align="alignright" width="460"] Suparna Airlines flew a 747-400BDSF from Shenzhen to Budapest, carrying face masks, test kits and ventilators. (Photo: Budapest Airport)[/caption] As the COVID-19 crisis worsens in Europe, a plethora of medical equipment and aid is now being flown in from China by a range of freighter aircraft, whether production, converted or makeshift. ASL Airlines Belgium is currently operating ten flights a week using 747-400Fs between Liege and China. While these flights transported medical supplies from Europe when the outbreak was concentrated in China, the 747s are now flying supplies like surgical masks back to Belgium for distribution across Europe. ASL said it had flown 15 million masks from Shanghai (PVG), Hangzhou (HGH) and Jinan (TNA) to Liege in the past week alone. ASL told Cargo Facts that while some of these flights are charters operated for various customers, most are part of the carrier’s scheduled network. ASL Airlines Belgium operates three 747-400Fs (30762, 33516 and 33946), having added unit 30762 on lease from China Airlines toward the end of last year. Other freighter operators have also been busy carrying supplies from China to Europe. Cargolux , for example, recently flew a 747-400F (33827) back to Luxembourg (LUX) full of medical supplies donated by the Henan government. Fellow 747F operator Suparna Airlines flew one of its 747-400BDSFs (28283) from Shenzhen (SZX) to Budapest (BUD) with seventy tonnes of cargo, including 3 million face masks, 100,000 coronavirus test kits and eighty-six ventilators, while Qeshm Fars Air operated one of its two 747-200Fs (24576) from SZX back to Iran, which has been one of the worst-hit countries in the world, with the fourth-highest number of COVID-19 deaths. Ethiopian Airlines this week flew medical equipment donated by the Jack Ma Foundation from Guangzhou (CAN) to Addis Ababa (ADD) using one of its 777Fs (65476). The supplies were then transported to the rest of Africa with Ethiopian’s two 737-800SFs. Meanwhile, Poland-based charter operator SkyTaxi positioned its single 767-200BDSF (23021) from Warsaw (WAW) to PVG to pick up medical supplies back to Poland. Apart from full freighters, a variety of passenger aircraft have been deployed as makeshift freighters in order to transport urgent aid and relief supplies. Some examples include Airbus, which used its sole A330-800 testbed aircraft to bring supplies from Tianjin (TSN) back to Toulouse (TLS); KLM, which flew a 747-400 Combi (28459) from PVG to Amsterdam (AMS); Lufthansa, which carried around thirty tonnes of goods from PVG to FRA with an A330-300; and Austrian Airlines, which used two 777-200ERs to fly supplies from Xiamen (XMN) to Vienna (VIE). But perhaps the most noteworthy move came from China Eastern Airlines . While Lufthansa and Austrian both maximized the capacity of the aircraft by stowing cargo on the seats in the passenger cabin, China Eastern went a step further and created an A330 Combi by removing blocks of seats in the cabin to allow for more maindeck space. This A330-200 was flown from PVG to Prague (PRG). The airline is reportedly converting several A330s into Combis. China Eastern is removing some seats on several Airbus A330 aircraft to transport medical supplies during #COVID19 outbreak. The first of these "combi" A330 aircraft sent millions of masks to Prague yesterday.

Kudos to China Eastern engineers for this creative idea. pic.twitter.com/d3xMKpCM7H — ChinaAviationReview (@ChinaAvReview) March 24, 2020

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