Proposal for Humanitarian Medical Airship Program: RAD-AID Straightline Aviation Collaboration Background RAD-AID is a nonprofit global health, medicalassistance humanitarian organization. RAD-AID is affiliated (in official-relations) with the World Health Organization of the United Nations, and received the 2019 Award from the United Nations Inter-Agency Task Force. RAD-AID has 13,000 medical volunteers serving 80 hospitals in 35 countries for 12 years. Straightline Aviation (SLA) and RAD-AID partnered in 2016 to develop and operate the world’s first-ever medical airship program based on Lockheed Martin’s innovative hybrid airship design. In the last 4 years, RAD-AID and SLA developed a network of medical equipment partners, such as Philips Healthcare, Bayer, and IBM Watson Health. SLA and RAD-AID also performed geographic information systems (GIS) analysis to create advanced digital maps of terrain and medically remote populations in regions lacking transport infrastructure (airports, trains, roads, etc.), where the hybrid airship can be especially beneficial. RAD-AID received an award from Johns Hopkins University for this innovative research on airship outreach operations.
Figure 1: Rendered illustration of Airship in Ghana. Source: Lockheed Martin, 2018.
Proposal: RAD-AID and SLA propose to develop and operate the hybrid airship program to bring vital medical assistance to populations in need. Regions of service include the following areas: 1. East Africa (Nairobi, Kenya as a hub) to reach underserved areas of east Africa. 2. Northern regions of North America, including Canada and the US where medically underserved workers and indigenous populations currently lack healthcare 3. Guyana, South America, and surrounding regions of northern South America and Caribbean.
Using the above hubs/regions of service, RAD-AID proposes to use the airship for disaster response where infrastructure has been destroyed, damaged or flooded. SLA and RAD-AID can also rapidly move the airship to disaster-stricken areas to deliver and distribute medical supplies, food, water and other crisis-response items. RAD-AID and SLA’s airship will deploy containerized clinics (designs below) for medical care and education:
Figure 2: Deployable units from airship cargo space have retractable wheels & durable construction
Modules can be placed along perimeter of deployable tent to provide mobile hospitals, shelter, schools:
Example of advanced clinic within containerized unit (side view below/left, photo illustration below/right):
Conclusion: RAD-AID and SLA are launching this initiative for crisis-response and medical assistance. For more info please contact Mike Kendrick & Mark Dorey (CEO and COO of SLA) mkendrick@straightlineaviation.com & mdorey@straightlineaviation.com, & Dr. Dan Mollura, RAD-AID’s CEO at dmollura@rad-aid.org , and Dr. Ryan England, RAD-AID Flight Operations Director, rengland@rad-aid.org . Thank you for your consideration.