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WELL-BEING

Irene Lores says operational safety is Air BP's priority during the pandemic.

AIR BP - By Irene Lores, Global General Aviation Sales and Marketing Director, Air BP

PROUD TO SUPPORT GLOBAL RESPONSE TO COVID-19

Over these past few months we have all had to accept the world is in a very different place. All of our lives are affected and many aircraft and airports have had to press ‘pause’ on their operations.

For those still flying – primarily on repatriation, freight and medevac flights – our customers around the world can continue to rely on Air BP. Our commitment to ensuring safe, reliable fuelling operations is unwavering.

Operational safety in supplying fuel to customers and the well-being of our people remain our absolute priorities. We’re doing all we can to support our partners and customers, monitoring the situation in line with advice from governments. Our already high standards of safety and hygiene at airport locations around the world have been enhanced and we are working closely with our airport partners to tackle new and rapidly evolving challenges head on.

As the impact of COVID-19 touches every corner of the globe, we’re supporting the communities in which we operate through a number of initiatives, working closely alongside our customers and partners.

In Australia we worked with our procurement team to donate 35,000 N95 masks to the Royal Flying Doctor Service (RFDS) for their frontline staff. Our donation builds on a long-standing relationship with the organization which spans decades of providing bespoke fuelling services. Air BP has also been a national partner of the RFDS for the past three years.

Also in Australia, Air BP’s rapid response helped to keep a Qantas Sydney to London ‘Kangaroo’ route going after Singapore banned stopovers in late-March. We provided an average of 266,000 liters of fuel per flight at Darwin Airport, enabling aircraft to continue on the historic nonstop 16-hour flight.

In France we are supporting an initiative led by Aviation Sans Frontières, an aviation charity dedicated to providing humanitarian assistance. We are donating 60,000 liters 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. We can support this critical service from our presence at 50 locations in France.

In the UK, Air BP is providing free jet fuel for use by the helicopters of a number of UK air ambulance services, supporting their life-saving work during the pandemic. All these services are charitable organizations which we already supply with jet fuel. The Yorkshire Air Ambulance and Great Western Air Ambulance receive fuel directly from Air BP, whilst Wales Air Ambulance and Midlands Air Ambulance Charity are supplied by Air BP customer Babcock International.

In the US Air BP is donating three 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 U.S. at greatest risk for COVID-19. We will also offset the carbon emissions of all donated fuel deliveries through the BP Target Neutral program.

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.

We are pleased to be able to play our part in supporting our communities during these difficult times. We are especially grateful too 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 COVID-19, which includes a $2 million USD donation to the WHO’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.

✈ A bout Air BP As the aviation division of bp, Air BP is one of the world’s leading suppliers of aviation fuel products and services. It has been investing in the aviation industry for more than 90 years to keep people flying safely around the world. Customers include commercial airlines, the military, business and private aircraft owners, airports and airfield operators. Air BP has a wide range of services to support its fuel offer including the design, build and operation of fuelling facilities, technical consultancy and training, low carbon solutions, the Sterling Card for efficient general aviation refueling and innovative digital platforms to increase efficiency and reduce risk.