Lufthansa and the German government have partnered to retrofit one of the fleet’s A340-300s into an aircraft that will be able to safely transport Ebola patients.
Lufthansa Technik will take D-AIGZ or ‘Villingen-Schwenningen’, remove several rows of seats and in their place install 4 Isolation Chambers for patient transport. The set up will allow easy access by medical professionals to their patients. Additionally, these Isolation Units will have dedicated air filtration systems that will be separate from the the rest of the aircraft’s ventilation systems.
According to Lufthansa, volunteer pilots and flight attendants will operate these flights and the aircraft will be available for any country that would have a need to transport Ebola patients.
The retrofit is expected to be completed by the end of November and the aircraft will be maintained for immediate deployment. The aircraft will obviously be removed from normal passenger service and WILL NOT be retrofitted with the new Premium Economy cabin as originally planned.