by DAVID AXE

An American medical charity has deployed a field hospital to northern Italy in order to help the country cope with the coronavirus pandemic.

And to get there, the charity rode in a high-performing, but rare, vintage airplane. A Douglas DC-8.

Samaritan’s Purse, a self-described “non-denominational evangelical Christian organization providing spiritual and physical aid to hurting people around the world,” has owned the DC-8 since 2015.

The four-engine airliner, originally built in 1968, flew with Finland’s Finnair airline and then with the French air force before Samaritan’s Purse acquired it.

The DC-8 was Douglas’s answer to Boeing iconic 707. Roomy and fast (it once went supersonic), the DC-8 nonetheless failed to compete with the 707 on the civil and military markets. Today just a few DC-8s remain in service, mostly as freighters and research planes.

Taking off from North Carolina on March 17, 2020, Samaritan’s Purse’s DC-8 hauled 20 tons of medical equipment and 32 medical personnel to Verona Villafranca airport in northeastern Italy, according to David Cenciotti of The Aviationist. Cenciotti followed the plane’s progress using an open-source transponder-tracking website.

The equipment and personnel will support a 68-bed field hospital consisting of 60 recovery beds and eight intensive-care beds.

“Our team of specialists will quickly set up our mobile medical facility in Cremona, about 50 miles outside of Milan, so that we can offer compassionate care to patients in desperate need,” Samaritan’s Purse stated.

“About two-thirds of all coronavirus deaths in Italy have been in the Lombardy region, where both Cremona and Milan are located, and the need for intensive care beds has quickly overwhelmed the healthcare system capacity,” the charity added.

“Senior adults are among the most susceptible to this disease, and Italy is home to the largest elderly population in all of Europe. Italy reported more than 700 deaths as a result of the coronavirus on Sunday and Monday, a huge increase in the country’s death toll, which now stands at more than 2,100.”

Building the hospital requires more than one load of equipment. Supported on the ground by the Italian air force, the DC-8 quickly unloaded and then took off for the United States. The plane soon should return to Italy.

Civilian and military cargo planes have played an important role in the world’s response to the coronavirus pandemic. A U.S. Air National Guard C-17 in mid-March 2020 hauled 500,000 coronavirus testing swabs to the United States from Italy.

Cargo planes also are functioning as mobile ICUs for patients requiring long-range transportation. An Italian air force KC-767 tanker-transport plane on Jan. 10, 2020 departed its base near Rome and headed east toward China.

Its mission. To fly back to Italy an Italian student who contracted the coronavirus in Wuhan, the center of the fast-expanding pandemic.

The Italian KC-767 is one of just a few military aircraft in the world that can carry the special “bio-containment” equipment that makes possible the safe evacuation of an extremely contagious patient.

The U.S. Air Force and Royal Air Force also possess aircraft and equipment for transporting infectious patients in isolation. American airmen have practiced transporting patients infected with the Ebola virus.

David Axe serves as Defense Editor of the National Interest. He is the author of the graphic novels  War Fix, War Is Boring and Machete Squad. 

Image: Reuters.