Business and general aviation fuel supplier Air BP has detailed how it is providing support to its customers and communities around the world during the Covid-19 pandemic.
In Australia Air BP’s procurement team is donating 35,000 N95 masks to the Royal Flying Doctor Service (RFDS) for their frontline staff. Air BP has been a partner of the RFDS for the past three years and has supplied the Service with fuel for several decades.
Also in Australia, Air BP has helped to keep the Qantas Sydney to London Kangaroo route going after Singapore banned stopovers in late-March. Air BP provided an average of 266,000 litres of fuel per flight at Darwin airport, enabling aircraft to continue on the historic non-stop 16-hour flight.
In France Air BP is supporting an initiative led by Aviation Sans Frontières, an aviation charity dedicated to providing humanitarian assistance. The company is donating 60,000 litres of jet fuel for flights that will transport medical staff and equipment between French hospitals. These flights are carried out free of charge when requested by medical authorities. With more than 50 locations in France, we are well positioned to support this critical service.
In the UK, Air BP is providing free jet fuel for use by the helicopters of a number of UK air ambulance services to support life-saving work during the pandemic including the Yorkshire Air Ambulance and Great Western Air Ambulance, Wales Air Ambulance and Midlands Air Ambulance Charity.
In the US Air BP is donating 3 million gallons of jet fuel to customers FedEx and Alaska Airlines to support the timely delivery of medical supplies and other essential goods, such as food and mail, to areas of the US at greatest risk for Covid-19. The company is also offseting the carbon emissions of all donated fuel deliveries through the BP Target Neutral programme.
In China, we have been providing support through our two joint ventures. To date, the South China Blue Sky joint venture has fuelled more than 800 epidemic relief and repatriation flights. Meanwhile at Shenzhen Airport, staff working with Shenzhen Chengyuan Aviation Oil Co. have been working round the clock to maintain aviation fuel supplies for chartered flights carrying medical and relief equipment to Wuhan and other cities in China.
Jon Platt, CEO of Air BP said, “We are pleased to be able to play our part in supporting our communities during these difficult times. Our commitment to safe, reliable fuelling operations remains unwavering and we’re grateful for the hard work of our front-line Air BP operators who continue to enable us to meet the needs of our customers.”
Air BP’s efforts form part of the wider BP response to the pandemic, which includes a US$2 million donation to the World Health Organisation’s Covid-19 Solidarity Response Fund; supporting mental health charity Mind to help more people access mental health support across the UK; providing free fuel to UK emergency service vehicles; providing discounted fuel for first responders, doctors, nurses and hospital workers in the US and donating bp’s supercomputing capability to help halt the spread of the virus.
You can read more about bp’s response to COVID-19 here.
