Local airlines gear up for vaccine transport

MANILA, Philippines — Local airlines are gearing up for the transport of COVID-19 vaccines, ensuring that they have the capabilities to support large-scale handling and distribution.

Philippine Airlines (PAL) president Gilbert Sta. Maria said the flag carrier is the only airline in the country which can take the vaccine from continental sources in Europe and the US, and deliver large quantities to satisfy maximum requirements and safety limits for carriage of dry ice.

“We can carry it from those continental locations and land them (at) whichever airport in the Philippines is most suitable,” Santa Maria said in an interview aired over state-run PTV at the weekend.

“For example, we can fly from Spain to Cebu to bring Moderna vaccines direct to the Visayas. We can fly from Spain direct to Davao to bring the Moderna vaccines there. If it’s AstraZeneca sourced out of Belgium, then we can do the same. That’s our capability because we are the only carrier in the Philippines with the ultra long-haul, large wide-body aircraft,” he affirmed.

Santa Maria said PAL has multiple options for aircraft that it can use across its fleet of medium wide-bodies, narrow bodies and turboprops.

“We are the only company in the Philippines that has the Dash-8 Dehavilland turboprops. Why does that matter? It’s because they fly as fast as jets. We can basically take the cargo from Manila to a secondary airport which is currently not served or to island-destinations that happened to have airports,” he said.

“The PAL team has been part of the cold chain logistics team organized by Secretary (Carlito) Galvez around the distribution of vaccines. We’re used to teamwork with different government agencies,” the PAL official said.

Budget carrier Cebu Pacific, for its part, said it is ready and fully capable as well to handle the transportation of the vaccines once they are available.

“Cebu Pacific has been carrying vaccines for some time now. And whether it’s for polio, for flu, we’re carrying a lot of medicines, primarily vaccines, throughout our network,” Cebgo president and CEO Alex Reyes said in the same interview.

Reyes said air transport would play a significant role in vaccine distribution as it is the mode that gets the vaccines quickly and on time in a certain location.

“The requirement for medicines is they have to be temperature-controlled, so that’s a very important requirement and we have to ensure that throughout their journey, when the medicines and vaccines are in our hands, we have to make sure that it doesn’t ever go beyond a certain temperature. The cold properties are actually maintained all throughout the journey,” he said.

Meanwhile, AirAsia Philippines has also expressed strong interest in helping in the vaccine transport, and is currently in the process of securing a process to do so.

“Vaccines are considered dangerous goods. At present, AirAsia is applying to CAAP (Civil Aviation Authority of the Philippines) for that permit. That’s the most important,” AirAsia Philippines CEO Ricky Isla said.

“The moment we are able to get our official permit as an air carrier to do transport of dangerous goods, we are very interested and we would like to help the country transport via air travel our vaccines not only to Metro Manila, but Metro Manila going to the provinces where we fly,” he said

Isla said the carrier can also set up chartered flights for special cities to support the government in terms of carrying the vaccines.

The International Air Transport Association said that air cargo plays a key role in the distribution of vaccines in normal times through well-established global time- and temperature-sensitive distribution systems.

Such capability, it said, would be crucial to the quick and efficient transport and distribution of COVID-19 vaccines when they are available, but it will not happen without careful planning, led by governments and supported by industry stakeholders.

The Luzon International Premier Airport Development Corp. (LIPAD), operator and manager of the Clark International Airport, earlier expressed plans to convert the gateway’s existing passenger terminal to a mass COVID-19 vaccination facility as it prepares to start operations of a new terminal with nearly double capacity by July.

“We are committed to offer the existing terminal to be used as a mass vaccination facility, and our services to provide a seamless, comfortable experience for our vaccinees,” LIPAD CEO Bi Yong Chungunco said last month.

Chungunco said the facility would be ready to vaccinate more than 10,000 people a day.

“Because what can be more perfect than having Clark International Airport as a vaccine hub and have a vaccination center right next door. Imagine, vaccines arriving, unloading, in five minutes it would be in cold storage, and when you need a vaccine, in five minutes it will be in the vaccination center ready to vaccine with minimal logistics requirements and fallout,” she said.