Latest news with #A400
The Star
01-06-2025
- General
- The Star
Armed Forces Starlight III humanitarian mission returns from Myanmar
SUBANG: The Malaysian Armed Forces (MAF) Starlight III team returned home on Sunday (June 1) night after completing a 38-day humanitarian mission in Myanmar following a major earthquake there on March 28. Two air force A400 aircraft carrying 69 personnel, comprising officers and personnel of various specialisations including the Forward Anaesthesia and Surgical Team (FAST), the Royal Engineers Regiment (RAJD), and Safety Team, landed at the Subang Air Base at 8.30pm. The official welcoming ceremony was officiated by the armed forces headquarters Chief of Staff Lt Gen Datuk Azhan Md Othman in recognition of the team's dedication and sacrifice in carrying out the humanitarian mission under the Malaysian Field Hospital banner. Also present were armed forces health services director-general Lt Gen Datuk Dr Zulkeffeli Mat Jusoh, air operations commander Lt Gen Datuk Masro Kaliwon, and joint forces headquarters Chief of Staff, Maj Gen Datuk Mohamed Fauzi Kamis. The MAF in a statement said Operation Starlight III reflected Malaysia's concern and solidarity with the people of Myanmar affected by the 7.7-magnitude earthquake that struck Sagaing and five other regions, followed by a 6.4-magnitude aftershock that was also felt in neighbouring countries including Thailand. The humanitarian mission was led by Col Dr Ahmad Farhan Ahmad Fuad as operations commander. It was officially activated on April 18 when the team was deployed to Sagaing to establish the field hospital. The field hospital began full operations on April 21, providing Level 2 medical services to local residents affected by the natural disaster. It treated 3,562 patients and conducted 493 surgical procedures, demonstrating the MAF's efficiency and compassion in delivering emergency medical aid in disaster zones. - Bernama
Yahoo
15-03-2025
- General
- Yahoo
Why huge military plane was flying low over reservoir this week
An RAF aircraft was spotted flying low over a reservoir earlier this week. The military plane was seen by a member of the Bolton News' Camera Club over Anglezarke Reservoir near Chorley on Tuesday, March 11. A RAF spokesperson said: "A single A400M Atlas from RAF Brize Norton, completed a routine currency sortie today around the Anglezarke area, which included a low level air drop. "This type of training ensures our pilots continue to be ready for global operations." The Atlas C.1 A400M model is capable over carrying a 37-tonne payload over 2,000nm, and was spotted a long way from its base in Oxfordshire. According to the RAF, the Atlas is capable of operating at altitudes up to 40,000ft but also "impressive" low-level capability. The aircraft is based at RAF Brize Norton in Oxfordshire and flies with four different squadrons. These are the 206 Test and Evaluation Squadron, the 30 Squadron, the LXX Squadron and the XXIV Squadron. The Atlas C.1 A400M aircraft was spotted over Anglezarke (Image: Dylan Harrison)Have a story? Get in touch at The Atlas is designed for carrying paratroopers and can hold as many as 116 fully-equipped troops. The RAF uses a variety of training areas around the whole of the UK for training and vary their routes and training locations for maximum training benefit. This allows pilots to train in varied environments to prepare for operations across the world. READ MORE: Former RAF pilot dies 'having lavished 103 years of love into the world' READ MORE: Minister condemns protesters who forced RAF out of university jobs fairs READ MORE: United States Air Force statement after aircraft fly over Bury The design of the Atlas was first proposed in February 1999 and accepted the following year. The first model had its maiden flight on December 11, 2009. The type is officially known as the Atlas but the term A400 is more commonly heard in use at its RAF Brize Norton base.
Sky News
14-03-2025
- Sky News
What we learnt flying over the world's largest iceberg A23a - and why it's not long for this world
One thousand feet above the world's largest iceberg, it's hard to believe what you're seeing. It stretches all the way to the horizon - a field of white as far as the eye can see. Its edge looks thin in comparison, until you make out a bird flying alongside and realise it is, in fact, a cliff of ice hundreds of feet high. Scientists who have used satellites to track the iceberg's decades-long meanderings north from Antarctica have codenamed the iceberg A23a. But up close, numbers and letters don't do it justice. It's a seemingly endless slab of white, fringed by an aquamarine glow - the ocean at its base backlit by a sill of reflective ice below. Monotonous yet magnificent; we're flying along the coastline of a nation of ice. And it's also hard to believe you're seeing it at all. Where it has run aground - 50 miles off the small island of South Georgia - seems impossibly remote. We're 800 miles from the Falkland Islands and 900 miles from the icy wastes of Antarctica. With no runway on South Georgia, there's only one aircraft that ever flies here. Once a month or so, a Royal Air Force A400 transport plane based in the Falklands carries out Operation Cold Stare - a maritime surveillance and enforcement flight over the British Overseas Territory that includes the neighbouring South Sandwich Islands. It's a smooth, albeit noisy, two-hour flight to South Georgia. But as the dramatic peaks of the island come into view, the ride - for us inexperienced passengers at least - gets scary. Gusts off the mountains and steep terrain throw the plane and its occupants around. Not that that stops the pilots completing their circuit of the island. We fly over some of its 500,000 square mile marine protected zone designed to protect the greatest concentration of marine mammals and birds on the planet that is found on South Georgia. Only then do we head out to the iceberg, and even though it's only a few minutes flying from South Georgia it's at first hard to see. It's so big and white it's indistinguishable from the horizon through the haze. Until suddenly, its edge comes into view. It's immediately apparent the A23a is not too long for this world. Large icebergs hundreds of metres across have already broken off and are drifting closer to South Georgia. All along its edges, cracks are appearing and arches at its base caverns are being eroded by the warmer ocean here, undercutting the ice, weakening it further. The iceberg might present a problem for some of South Georgia's super-abundant penguins, seals and seabirds. A jumble of rapidly fragmenting ice could choke up certain bays and beaches in which colonies of the animals breed. The trillion tonnes of fresh water melting out of the iceberg could also interfere with the food webs that sustain marine life. However, the breeding season is coming to an end and icebergs are also known to fertilise oceans with sediment carried from the Antarctic continent. The impact on shipping is more relevant. There's not much of it down here. But fishing vessels, cruise ships and research teams ply these waters and smaller lumps of ice called "growlers" are a regular risk. A23a will create many. Icebergs this big are too few for scientists to know if they are becoming more frequent or not. But they are symptomatic of a clearly emerging trend. As our climate warms, Antarctica is slowly melting. It's losing around 150 billion tonnes of ice a year - half of it breaking off the continent in the form of icebergs calving from glaciers, the rest melting directly from its vast ice sheets as temperatures gradually rise. The pace of A23a's disintegration is far, far faster. It will disappear in months, not millennia.
