Indian Air Force planes airlift O2 tankers to Odisha

Hyderabad: As the hospitals across the country are facing acute shortage of oxygen and are unable to meet the demand following the steep spike in Covid-19 cases, the Centre has finally swung into action and has pressed the Indian Air Force (IAF) into action.

The IAF deployed its C-17 and IL-76 heavy-lift aircraft for transportation of oxygen containers to filling stations, officials said. Containers filled with oxygen are generally not transported on board military aircraft as they are considered combustible and may pose risk to the planes.

But keeping the emergency-like situation in view, nine empty oxygen tankers from Telangana were airlifted to Odisha on Friday to bring back oxygen faster to the state for supply to hospitals treating Covid patients.

Two C-17 planes of the IAF were used to airlift the tankers from Begumpet Airport in Hyderabad to liquid oxygen plants in Odisha. Health Minister Eatala Rajender and Chief Secretary Somesh Kumar supervised the airlifting operation at the airport.

Rajender said the tankers will return by road to bring 150 tonnes of oxygen to the State by April 27.

He claimed that this is the first instance in the country where warplanes were used to airlift oxygen tankers.

The advantage of airlifting of the tankers to Angul and Rourkela steel plants in Odisha is that it will save three days in transportation. The Health Minister said the Telangana government was ready to spend any amount of money to save people's lives. The government has installed liquid oxygen tanks in 22 government hospitals. This move will ensure that there is no shortage of oxygen at government hospitals, the minister added.

However, the Minister said that it was unfortunate that the Centre had never made States participants in taking decisions regarding control of pandemic or other related issues, including pricing of vaccines.

He said though Prime Minister Narendra Modi had held several video conferences with States, it was restricted to knowing the ground situation but never considered the suggestions of the States nor were they taken into confidence while taking decisions.

It was the Centre which had taken decisions and imposed them on States. Even in case of vaccine supply or fixing the rates at which it would be supplied to the Centre and States, the Centre did not plan properly resulting in some sort of crisis, the minister said.