The evangelical aid organization Samaritan’s Purse supports Italy in the fight against the Corona virus. To this end, Samaritan’s Purse flew a field hospital complete with ventilator and medical personnel to Verona on March 17, 2020 – with a Douglas DC-8-72, built in 1969.
The aircraft that landed at Verona-Villafranca Airport in Italy is a veteran: built as a freighter in 1968, it joined Finnair in January 1969. It flew there until 1981, after which it was in service with the French Air Force until 2004, when the original JT3D turbofans were replaced with fuel-efficient CFM-56s. Later, the DC-8 flew for Air Transport International and, from 2015, finally for the U.S. aid organization Samaritan’s Purse. There, it provides disaster relief. It is also one of fewer than ten DC-8s flying worldwide.
While the United States Air Force flew all the military stuff and planes out of Afghanistan, at the Samaritan’s Purse DC-8 helped out to bring back personnel, of women activists houses that supported Afghan women and schools for the past 20 years. On that day, her actual routing was XJD-PIK-GSO but because of the bad weather and not enough fuel to circle at PIK, the crew decided to stop via Germany. Stop like Ramstein, Frankfurt, Wiesbaden, and Stuttgart were possible airports for a stop. Over the alps, the crew decided to fly via STR, because of the good connections to the US in the Barracks close to Stuttgart and the US Army/Air Force airfield. She did a night stop and continued her way to GSO the next day. Also listed are many cargo and passenger flights via Ramstein with the Israeli Air Force 707-3L6C Re’em that arrived from Nevatim Air Base and other flights due to the Operation Allied Refuge! Also, some cargo flights went via Frankfurt to pick up Oxygen and other stuff for example the Indian Air Force C-17.
