In the early hours of the morning, a Voyager jet departed RAF Brize Norton for the Falkland Islands carrying 3,000 doses of the AstraZeneca vaccine.
In the early hours of this morning, an RAF Air Tanker flight departed @RAFBrizeNorton for the Falkland Islands carrying doses of the AstraZeneca vaccine.
Delivered on behalf of the @FCDOGovUK, it reaffirms the UK Government’s commitment to supporting its Overseas Territories. pic.twitter.com/eeSSjfqbc9
— Ministry of Defence 🇬🇧 (@DefenceHQ) February 1, 2021
Just under 10 million in the UK have now have their first dose of the vaccine.
James Heappey, Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Defence, said:
“Defence has to date delivered 10,725 doses of the Pfizer vaccine to Gibraltar. Further deliveries are planned to the Falkland Islands and Gibraltar by the end of today, of 6,825 Pfizer doses and 3,000 AstraZeneca doses respectively.
Defence is scoping the delivery of 65,850 further vaccine doses to Ascension Island, Gibraltar and the Falklands throughout February, and of course we stand ready to support vaccine delivery to all the British territories overseas.”
Fantastic!
I hope we are doing similar to other UK friends and relations around the world. Soft power and doing the right thing for mankind.
Unmarked aircraft other than civil registrations (MOD photo)….are these the spare Voyagers for civil use?
To answer my own question: the aircraft in the for-ground is Air Tankers ex Thomas Cook….short loaned to Turkish airlines but back with Air Tankers now.
Gibraltar has managed to vaccinate around a third of its population.
Falkland population was about 3400 in 2016 apparently, so they should be pretty much good to go with this.