Still flying high in the face of fears over virus
DIEGO BENEDETTO, an Italian captain with China Eastern Airlines in Wuhan, is still flying across the country.
But he is deeply concerned about his family back home in the Hubei Province capital.
But, as a former military pilot in the Italian and US air forces, Benedetto always tells his colleagues “duty takes priority.”
“In this hard period, my heart is full of good feelings. I am impressed. I am full of admiration. For my colleagues, for the leaders, for the company, for Chinese society and its people,” Benedetto said.
The 59-year-old first came to China in 1983 as part of the first official Italian military delegation to the country and again in 1995 as a tourist.
After service as a military and as a commercial pilot in Europe, Africa and the Middle East, he became a captain with China Eastern in 2018 and moved to Wuhan.
Before the coronavirus epidemic, both his wife and son had felt uncomfortable. After taking them to hospital and making sure they were fine, Benedetto returned to the company for intensive missions amid the global outbreak.
During his flights outside Wuhan, Benedetto could only book online meals for his family and ask about their condition through short messages.
“Wuhan is an impressive city. It has the most spectacular light show I ever saw. It has the style and the strength to host major world events, like the World Military Games,” said Benedetto.
In a letter to his colleagues in Wuhan, he wrote: “You will win, because there is no difficulty stronger or bigger than you. You are really the best.”
Domestic airlines and the civil aviation industry have been sparing no efforts to help prevent the spread of the coronavirus.
Pilots such as Benedetto and other civil aviation employees are being deployed on flights to transport medical groups and materials to coronavirus-hit regions, as well as protecting passengers from the epidemic.
China Eastern has been dispatching planes all over the world to make sure medical teams and vital supplies are delivered to Wuhan and other Hubei cities.
Four charter flights took off from Shanghai and three other cities to send doctors and nurses to Wuhan on January 28.
The flights carried a total of 559 medical staff and 17 tons of disease prevention material.
To transport as many supplies as it could, the carrier substituted a widebody Airbus 330 for the previously planned single-aisle A320 aircraft to take a second batch of 148 doctors and nurses from Shanghai hospitals to Wuhan.
The local medical team took 803 pieces of luggage weighing a total of 11.7 tons with them, compared with the 4.7 tons taken by the first Shanghai medical team to support work at Wuhan’s Jinyintan Hospital.
Flight MU800 took off from Hongqiao airport at 5:53pm and landed at Wuhan Tianhe airport at 7:15pm. The medical team rushed to the hospital to assist other local medical staff who has been working continuously for four days.
On the same day, charter flights took off from Lanzhou in northwest Gansu Province, Xining in northwest Qinghai Province and Yinchuan in northwest Ningxia Hui Autonomous Region, carrying medical teams and materials.
The Shanghai-based carrier has also been coordinating its foreign flights to transport disease prevention material. Medical protective suits, goggles and masks have been delivered to Wuhan on China Eastern flights from New York and Los Angeles.
Other local carriers are also contributing to the prevention campaign.
Spring Airlines, China’s biggest budget carrier, said it would be transporting all disease prevention material free of charge.
It has also opened an emergency green channel at Shijiazhuang airport in central China’s Hebei Province, which is close to Hubei, to receive medicines and disease prevention material around the clock.
Juneyao Airlines rerouted an OsakaPudong flight to Wuhan to send 94 stranded passengers back home on January 28.
After Wuhan closed its airport to outgoing passengers on January 23, some travelers from Hubei were stranded in Japan following a large number of flight cancelations.
Flight HO1340 was originally scheduled to take off from Kansai International Airport at around 8pm and land at Pudong at 9:30pm.
However, after approval from China’s civil aviation authority, an Airbus 321 took off from Osaka at about 9pm and landed at Wuhan Tianhe International
Airport at 11:10pm.
The aircraft carried the 94 Hubei passengers along with 19 boxes of protective outfits and masks that Juneyao had purchased in Japan.
“The flight will land at Wuhan and welcome you home,” Dong Wei, general manger with the airline’s Japanese office, told passengers onboard. Passengers applauded the announcement, as seen in a video recorded during the flight.
Eleven crew members, including two captains, a copilot, six flight attendants and two security guards, volunteered to operate the flight and served passengers while wearing masks, gloves and goggles, according to the carrier.
They will be quarantined for two weeks after returning to Shanghai.
All passengers were willing to fly back to Wuhan and full prevention measures were made ahead of the flight, the carrier said. They received multiple temperature checks before boarding the aircraft and were given masks and other protective items.
The Shanghai-based airline will transport another 30,000 protective outfits and other supplies from Japan, Thailand and Finland to Wuhan and other regions affected by the outbreak, the carrier said.
Shanghai Airport Authority has constructed a “firewall” to help prevent the spread of the outbreak.
Staff at Hongqiao and Pudong airports are checking temperatures and registering all passengers flying into Shanghai.
Passengers with high temperatures will be sent to designated medical facilities. Further intensified disinfection and ventilation measures have also been carried out at terminal buildings, transport hubs, shuttle buses and toilets at both airports.