An Airbus Foundation humanitarian mission supported by Airbus Protect

On November 8th, the Airbus Foundation chartered the Airbus A330-900 NEO MSN 1795, a test aircraft from Airbus Flight Tests, to bring medicine and health equipment to the Central African Republic.

Joanna Augustin, an Airbus Protect engineer, had the chance to be a part of this humanitarian mission, as a flight dispatcher. 

Along with her colleague Xavier Adhemard from Airbus Flight Test Operations, Joanna was in charge of dealing with overflight and landing permits and managing the routes despite several constraints such as Niger and Libya overflying prohibition. Her mission also consisted in analysing and preparing the flight folder for the crew, and organising facilities at all stops (ground handling, refueling, immigration,etc.).

Three non-governmental organisations (the Red Cross, “Médecins du Monde”, and “Solidarités International”) had collected more than 17 tonnes of freight from all over Europe. All these packages were loaded in the aircraft cargo holds in Lyon, in the afternoon of the 8th.

In the early morning on Thursday, 9th, the team left Lyon for an 8-hour flight to the Central African Republic capital, Bangui.

Upon arrival in Bangui, the NGOs and French embassy were very grateful for all the medicine and health equipment delivered. They explained that they had been waiting for these supplies for many weeks.

The stop was successful despite challenging local constraints, and the A330 NEO flew to Douala, the Cameroon economic capital, on their journey back. This stop allowed the team to rest and refuel before their journey to Toulouse on Friday, 10th.

Congratulations to the crew, composed of pilots, a Flight Test Engineer, Test Flight Engineers, a maintenance team, flight dispatchers, and a security engineer and to Airbus Foundation for this meaningful mission!

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