Emergency cargo on biggest jet
Antonov-124 lands, loads equipment for Japan
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Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 20/05/2011 (5439 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.
THE largest cargo plane in the world was loading made-in-Manitoba equipment Thursday at the James A. Richardson International Airport, destined for earthquake relief in Japan.
The massive nose-loading Antonov-124 cargo jet took on eight 3.6-metre-cubed crates of specially designed industrial filters and silencers made by VAW Systems Ltd. of Winnipeg.
VAW is a leading supplier of noise-control products for the commercial HVAC (heating, ventilation and air conditioning), industrial fan and blower and gas-turbine generation market.
The industrial filters and silencers shipped out Thursday were for an urgent order from Pratt & Whitney for use in a 50-megawatt mobile gas-turbine power generator.
Larry Boitson, VAW’s sales manager, said the company has made silencers and filter housings for similar Pratt & Whitney turbines in the past, but the need for power in Japan in the aftermath of the earthquake and the damage to the Fukushima nuclear reactor explained the urgency of the order.
“We already were working on an order for another Pratt & Whitney customer, but it seems there was a greater need to get this one to Japan,” he said.
It’s the first time VAW has put together an order to be shipped via air cargo. Next week, another load of hot-rolled steel silencers and filters that keep out the tiniest particulate from the power-generating turbines is to be shipped for another mobile generator in Japan.
Russian-based Volga-Dnepr Airlines is the operator of the Antonovs, the largest cargo plane in the world. An Antonov-124 was used last month to airlift a large concrete pump from Germany to Japan to help cool reactors damaged in the Fukushima nuclear accident.
There are only about 40 An-124s in existence.They have landed in Winnipeg before, as recently as earlier this month, but typically only for fuel and supplies, rarely to take on cargo.
martin.cash@freepress.mb.ca