Global Aviation Services Group Arranged Hundreds of COVID-19-Related Cargo Flights To-Date Transporting Critical Test Kits, Personal Protective Equipment (PPE) and Other Necessities
Air Partner, a global aviation services group, announced today that the company’s freight division has carried out more than 160 dedicated cargo flights globally since February to support the urgent demand for personal protective equipment (PPE), COVID-19 test kits and other necessities in the fight against COVID-19 (“novel coronavirus”). In total, Air Partner has delivered more than 12 million kilograms of cargo thus far to the U.S. and Europe from China and Southeast Asia on a range of chartered freighter aircraft such as the Antonov AN-124, Boeing 747-400F, Boeing 777F, Boeing 767F, and Airbus A330F. Additionally, Air Partner’s freight team used their extensive experience to charter numerous passenger configured aircraft to move urgent PPE cargo, as an innovative approach to overcome the global cargo aircraft capacity crunch during the height of the COVID-19 pandemic.
“We’ve been working with our clients around the clock to ensure critical supplies arrive safely and as quickly as possible to the places and people that need them most during these challenging times,” said David McCown, president of Air Partner U.S. “Our dedicated freight team has extensive experience in arranging time-critical air shipments in some of the most challenging situations imaginable, and during times of crisis such as the COVID-19 pandemic, we’re committed to helping our clients every step of the way.”
Most recently, Air Partner supported U.S.-based freight forwarder Radiant Global Logistics in their participation in Project Airbridge, a COVID-19 emergency response initiative led by the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA). With the assistance of Air Partner in identifying the best aircraft charter solutions, Radiant was able to expedite the delivery of medical supplies, such as N95 masks, surgical gowns, and gloves from international manufacturers to points across the United States.
Additionally, during the height of the COVID-19 pandemic, Air Partner assisted Radiant in the urgent transportation of more than 5,000 experimental COVID-19 test kits from South Korea to Washington, D.C. The test kits were shipped under highly regulated specifications in temperature-controlled containers and required hourly temperature checks to ensure they stayed inside the required frozen range throughout the flight. Furthermore, in February, Air Partner operated a flight from Philadelphia to Rome containing temperature-controlled pharmaceutical goods, which required similar logistics to ensure the integrity of the products during transport.
Due to the impact that COVID-19 has had on global supply chains, Air Partner’s freight team is now starting to see an uptick in requests for the transportation of commodities from new clients. This includes the movement of high-value items, as well as delayed goods that have been held up as a result of the loss of belly cargo operations on passenger aircraft. As the global air freight industry continues to be limited by the lack of passenger aircraft and dedicated belly space, Air Partner’s freight team is available to provide dedicated cargo aircraft charters that provide vital assistance to clients in a wide range of industries to keep their businesses moving.
With a global network of cargo specialists on-hand 24/7, Air Partner’s freight division provides dedicated chartered aircraft of every size to fly cargo anywhere, at any time. Serving freight forwarders, governments and aid organizations with everything from urgent ‘go now’ requirements to the most complex project cargo shipments taking months to plan, Air Partner has the skills, experience, and expertise to ensure the seamless delivery of cargo when it matters most.
“As carriers move goods around the globe, they face major challenges navigating through relevant trade regulations, sanctions and embargoes. Together with Etihad Cargo, E2open is streamlining the process to dramatically simplify the complexity of staying abreast of ever evolving trade regulations, automating the screening of shipments, thereby providing best in class compliance safeguards for Etihad customers while reducing shipment processing costs,” said Santosh Nanda, general manager of E2open’s Logistics Service Providers business unit. “This partnership with Etihad Cargo, one of the world’s leading air cargo carriers, will allow air cargo shippers to benefit from automated screening capabilities by simplifying global shipping and ensuring rapid screening so that products consistently arrive on time thereby increasing customers satisfaction.”
In addition to comprehensive compliance checks based on global regulations, the E2open carrier cargo screening application also ensures alignment with Etihad Cargo’s strict protocols that prevent the carriage of endangered and threatened species, hunting trophies containing any animal parts, shark fins and live animals intended for use in scientific research.
