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ALMOST ONE MILLION surgical gowns have arrived in Shannon Airport on board the Antonov AN-225, the world’s largest aircraft.
The plane touched down at 1.45pm this afternoon from China, after stopping in Baku earlier this morning.
The consignment of PPE is the largest ever ordered by Ireland with 900,000 gowns arriving today. A further 100,000 arrived on Monday on board a Boeing 747.
According to the HSE, this PPE will last 12.5 days under the current levels of demand, and will be distributed across the country to healthcare workers.
Speaking on Morning Ireland, Shannon Airport operations director Niall Maloney said that it had been a difficult 10 weeks for the airport, but that staff had wanted to help respond to the Covid-19 pandemic.
“We really wanted to play our part in the Covid pandemic response by being open for cargo aircraft,” he said.
“For an airport like us, this really has been a struggle but we can now see a light at the end of the tunnel, and thankfully the resumption of passenger flights from 1 July really is the start of a long road to recovery”
Due to its size, the plane is unable to land in any other airport in Ireland and can only use the 3km long runway in Shannon.
With a wing span of 88 metres, the AN-225 is as wide as the Croke Park pitch, with a height of six stories.
Designed in the 80s by the then-Soviet Union, the plane was used to transport the Buran spacecraft and weighs 640 tonnes.
This is the fourth time the Antonov AN-225 has landed in Shannon Airport, with it previously landing in April 2015 to refuel.
Well done Shannon airport best airport in the country
@: as in the best bit of tarmac?
@: LMAO
@jackamy: you’ll find no other airport in country can take this airplane
@Conall Foynes: M50 runway.
@jackamy: like bishop Brennan, the best bishop in the world by miles!
@: Yeah great airport. Perfect for the US military planes
we need to get rid of this ”Made In China” crap and start making this stuff here … provide jobs and help ourselves for once
@Marcus Mc Cann: There’s no global market for something China can produce for half the price and as we saw from the strawberry farm needing to import Bulgarians during a period of 25% unemployment, Irish people don’t want labour intensive low paying jobs.
@Rochelle: Both costs of production and cost of living here are factors why this is so.
@Marcus Mc Cann:
Go for it yourself if you think there’s a gap in the market and profit to be made.
Need employees? good luck with that one however.
@iohanx: if we stopped paying money to people to do nothing, I think it might be more achievable than you think.
I’m always amazed at how misunderstood some people come across to how capitalism works.
@Marcus Mc Cann: Totally agree, why we didn’t have pop up shops making PPE gear from the beginning in every town in the country baffles me. Hopefully, it will be in their plan going forward for future such crisis.Brining in garments from slave labour countries that don’t fit or not fit for purpose, is farcical.
@Marcus Mc Cann: There is a company, Irema, based in Limerick who manufacturing PPE
@Marcus Mc Cann: yes need to rod of china. I dont know why Irish Gov placing order china.
@Rochelle: That’s racist.
@DERRY1973: Agreed – unemployed over 6 months – here is a job doing blah blah blah …. you don’t want it ? No problem but your dole is cutoff …..
@Marcus Mc Cann: this supply is only good for 12 days! we need to do what Intel do and buy reusable ones that can be cleaned professionally
@DERRY1973: People like me you mean, who don’t work. Thanks I appreciated the under the poverty invalidity pension I receive.
I do feel guilty that the state who I paid tax all my working life and a lot higher rates than now pay some of it back to me.
As regards doing nothing, I do a hell of a lot for my community and add more than a paying income tax would
@Pranab Vasudeva: Because that where it made at the volumes needed now
@Rochelle: There is also the simple little fact that Irish people do not know hoe to pick fruit quickly and properly
@Dodzer33: Thats conscribed labour.
Is it not a little late?
@Ciaran Farrelly: think it’s to do with stockpiling for (potential) second wave
@Ciaran Farrelly: maybe it’s not a bad idea to restock?!
@Ciaran Farrelly: Have another read Ciaran. 12.5 days worth.
@Chief: actually can you all have another read of the article!
@Ciaran Farrelly: No it is not late, even if if not big news anymore, COVID 19 is still here, and when the second wave hit our health service will be more prepared.
@Ciaran Farrelly: FG like wasting money.
Children’s hospital, Printers that don’t fit.
Parade is for the Black and Tans etc.
@Pád: I’ll give you the first two but the third one is nonsense
@Pád: your some tool.
I wish I had known, would have gone to see it come in!
@Peter: how ya Peter
Probably the only plane landing at Shannon today. It’s been run into the ground by present management.
@Tom O’Hanlon: I’m curious to know what you mean? It’s a genuine question.
@Tom O’Hanlon: Plenty of cargo in and out everyday. As well as that Omni are still in and out twice a day with US troops. Fair enough, scheduled passenger services are stopped, but that’s down to the pandemic not the management.
Doesn’t really matter if you get 800 pallets if none of them are up to standard. How much of this will be substandard?Boycott Chinese products, Free Hong Kong.
@Colm Mac Suibhne: might have no choice if that Occupied Territory’s Bill passes…
Wrong from the journal. Last time the plane was in shannon was the 16.11.2019
@Sebastian Schulze: It wasn’t. I work beside the airport and have a view of the airfield.
@Jonathan McCoy: T’was on a Sunday.
@Jonathan McCoy: if you want you can have the picture I have done was 10 o’clock in the evening
@Sebastian Schulze: that was the AN-124 that day. Still a beast of an aircraft but nowhere near as big as AN-225.
@☀David Grogan✈: Good man David, great bit of nerdness there to put know-it-all Seb in his place (and I am saying that with genuine respect for your knowledge of the detail, seriously)
@Sebastian Schulze: I’d say that was the 124. And it comes in fairly often.. it’s been in a few times in the last year
@Sebastian Schulze: It would’ve been the 124. The 225 was in maintenance for over a year and only flew again the end of March this year.
It’s amazing that 1 million gowns only last 12.5 days. It means every patient bed (not just Covid/intensive care beds) requires about 6 gowns daily (I’m not suggesting in any way that healthcare staff should use less).
@Conall: every time a care worker is in contact with a Covid query patient it requires a full change off PPE to protect other patients and staff. Given we still have a high amount of query Covid cases we still need to be vigilant. Given the difficulty in social distancing for staff in most hospitals, masks are very much the norm.
@Conall: I was wondering why they can’t be washed at 60° and reused. Obviously we took no chances at the start of the pandemic when no one knew anything about the new virus. But surely reusable gowns could be introduced now?
@Paul Murphy: I’m obviously not a medic and I know that they’re not using it for fun – you’ve clarified it a bit.
They are doing that in some hospitals, and sending the goggles to the CSSD to sterilise to reuse again.
It is ‘Antonov An-225 Mriya’ and it is Ukrainian-owned now.
Too late. The party is over.
@Locojoe: It’s important to stockpile and be prepared. Three months ago we were almost overwhelmed because we didn’t prepare in advance. Lessons must be learned.
@Locojoe: 12.5 days worth of PPE at current usage. How is it too late?
@Jerry Higgins: aer lingus planes flying every day to Beijing for ppe.
@Breda Kelly: over 200 Aer Lingus flights to Beijing since the end of March. 4 or 5 flights every day.
@Locojoe:
Know nothing stupid comment.
Well played China, well played
Any idea when it takes off?
@Glen Hanratty: 10:30am tomorrow morning.
@Jonathan McCoy: friday morning I think
Flew right over my house.i was kicken I couldn’t see it through my binoculars due to the clouds.fingers crossed it fly’s back over tmw
The EU gotta start manufacturing high quality ppe and stop buying substandard junk.
@rodgerw@eircom.net: where was your phone made?
@rodgerw@eircom.net:
When did you inspect the equipment delivered? Perhaps you just like to make stupid comments?
@David Clements:@rodgerw@eircom.net: where was your phone made?
More like where was his father’s condom made…….
@Doug: did you not see the video of the masks being made there. Dropped from the person using a sewing machine onto a dirty floor to be stacked by someone else. A few half dressed lads sitting around a tiny room making them. Sterile or what !!
Is there no way these garments can be cleaned and reused?
@Dave Phelan: they are washing them at 60-70° in some hospitals and reusing them.
Send it straight back – I don’t want anything made by slaves for the totalitarian Chinese Communist Party.
@Pat Coyne: Oh do you not? I’m sure it’s no hassle to send it all back…you better let the HSE know how you feel as they mightnt be reading the Journal comments. I’m sure they can get the 900,000 gowns from another country of your choosing
@Pat Coyne: Good man, stand up for your principles. You better send half of your cloths, your TV, phone, computer and much more back so.
@Pat Coyne: pat one month later. This government is the worst ever. How could they not have PPE?
@Ciarān:
Ciarán, why do you and your comrades support both the continuation of slavery and Marxist Totalitarian governments?
@Pat Coyne: What phone do you use, you need to do a full check on all the electronics in you life. For starters
@John fitzpatrick: No country in the world had enough PPE
I would’ve thought Croke Park was wider than 88m.
@Killian Ryan: The pitch it says. Not the whole stadium.
A great silver bird has flown in from another continent with protective equipment for Irish medical workers. Good news, but let’s not make a cargo cult out of it.
Send it back! I don’t want anything from the Chinese Communist Party.
@Pat Coyne:
It’s not for you!!
Are they any good
Remember the aer lingus photos and the terrible ppe
Best of if had made in Germany or Europe
Quality over quantity any day
@Richy Fitz: Germany can’t even keep their own doctors in PPE, let alone providing it for others.
@Richy Fitz:
Disposable PPE just needs to be functional for the forecast short duration of their life span, not top quality.
You can rest assured stuff coming from China now precisely meets this criteria.
@Richy Fitz: Quality over quantity are you serious. That counts in long term items not something that needs to be changed after contact with one infected person to a complete clean set.
I’ve seen bigger…
@Michael Bodycoach: ha ha ..
Nowadays the countries that provide the solution are also the ones that caused the problem. They create the demand for their products first by starting a conflict or pandemic, then supply arms or medical/protective equipment later.
@Kartz: A bit like anti-virus software companies?
@Kartz: It’s a pity for your theory that all plagues in history have travelled along the same trade routes, striking China, Sicily, Northern Italy and spreading across Continental Europe, then to parts of Scandinavia. The only difference here is that it didn’t spread by ships alone and moved faster.
Also, the only comparable warlike exceptions I can think of were the 1918 flu’ pandemic & the bombing of Nagasaki and Hiroshima. Both came from America. I don’t recall them offering international help. In fact they passed a law to say nothing.
@Kartz: I’ve noticed a coincidental link between fire engines and house fires. It’s curious how they’re always there. Are they there because of the fire or is the fire there because of them? Hmmm…
Why not show a larger photo of the plane. I would like to have seen it.
@John Scully: it was so big it wouldn’t fit in the photo
@Shane Brigdale: Maybe the pilot will be on the Late Late show? Maybe they’ll pre-record an interview in the cockpit?
@John Scully: https://www.jetphotos.com/aircraft/Antonov%20An-225%20Mriya
Fill your boots Johnny boy
Weeks before the country reopens…. ye, well done to this incompetent caretaker government!
@Niall Binéad: totally agree. Great idea to stock up seeing as Covid will be around for the rest of the year. I’m surprised you’re giving the government praise, very decent of you.
@Niall Binéad: This lot won’t even last two weeks, kid. It says so right there in the article. I imagine this article is more about the airplane than the cargo. Aer Lingus planes have been flying to and from Beijing since March bring in PPE; multiple flights per week. There’s a LOT of PPE coming into the country.
It’s not like a Shinner to allow facts get in the way of a good whinge about the gubberment, is it?
@Niall Binéad:
Usually know nothing shinner comment!!
@Niall Binéad: As well as the ≈30x Aer Lingus flights per week into Ireland for PPE, Silkway West Airlines operated 3x B747-400Fs into SNN with around 300 tons of supplies. Also, you have Emirates, Etihad and Qatar operating widebody passenger flights, either as ‘passenger freighters’ or repatriation flights into DUB, and you can be sure they are carrying PPE in their belly holds as well as general cargo. To think the govt. are only acting now is absurd. The flight program with EI on DUB-PEK-DUB is incredible. First week of June, EI were the #4 carrier in terms of widebody passenger operations from China to Europe with 30x flights. The only airlines ahead of them were Air China, China Southern and China Eastern. 3x of the largest airlines in the world….
@Niall Binéad: They governments response has been cited as one of the better ones in Europe.
They are still the government until a new one is formed. Stop playing politics with a pandemic.
Meanwhile Europe and China now turn their backs on air freight and use the Silk rail Road for transport
@Trevor: Not true. There has only been a slight contraction in freighter capacity out of China over the last 4 weeks. Only in the last 2-3 weeks have the ‘passenger freighter’ operations contracted. And besides, it’s only natural to look for a more cost effective mode of transport once times sensitivities of shipments allow such.
& who has done the majority of work in arranging such flights????
About time they used a proper cargo aircraft that can take a good load all in one go. Should have been using this aircraft from the start instead Messing about with boxes on seats of green passenger aircraft while the pilots go on the late late calling themselves “hero’s”
@Lando Griffen: One day of Aer Lingus operations PEK-DUB carries more PPE than that Antonov 225. Do you think that aircraft just sits around and is available 24/7 for Ireland? While I agree, nothing ‘heroic’ about the Aer Lingus operation, but, it is a great set up and was initiated extremely quickly and effectively.
@Bran Brans: indeed. 1 day of Lingus ops can carry what 1 225 carries. Average of 4-5 flights a day on a Lingus 330. Fuel , emissions etc. Lots of proper freighters 767 330 310 available that could have done the operation quicker and with less flights by not bulking out as quick as a pax aircraft.
Of course the 225 is in high demand at the moment and rightly so. As is the 747F out there
@Lando Griffen: EI only have to cover their variable costs as the fixed and overhead costs are already there. You lease in capacity from other providers, you need to cover variable, fixed and overhead costs, plus a huge margin. EI know exactly what they are doing and if they felt their own 330 operation wasn’t a viable option then they wouldn’t do it. Oh, and btw, when’s the last time you saw a 310 or 767 freigter operating China – Europe?
PPE should be reusable – Intel do this all the time- it should be cheaper in the long term
A great health saving delivery by an enormous plane..
No doubt such huge planes ,the future will be
and highly fuel efficient …
and perhaps the Green Party can allow with Fine Gael-Fáil
such planes to land in Dublin.
It’s arrived too early for the next pandemic which is expected only after 10 years at the current rate.
have your say