A boy has been urgently transferred due to a serious medical condition on board an Italian Air Force aircraft. The transport request, which was necessary to guarantee the patient immediate specialist medical care, was sent by the Prefecture of Cagliari to the Situation Room of the Air Force General Staff, which ordered the flight to be carried out. The aircraft, a Falcon 50 belonging to the 31st Wing of Ciampino (Rome), landed at the “Mario Mameli” airport of Elmas-Cagliari at 12:46 and departed at 13:15 for the “Cristoforo Colombo” airport in Genoa, where it arrived after about 1 hour of flight time. The boy, accompanied by his mother and assisted during the flight by the medical staff of the Cagliari hospital, upon his arrival in Genoa was transported by ambulance to the “Gaslini” paediatric hospital, where he was admitted to the surgery ward. Cagliari-Elmas airport currently represents, for the whole of southern Sardinia, the most frequently used airport for this type of flight, as it is close to the main hospital facilities in the regional capital. The aircraft of the 31st Wing of Ciampino are used for state transport and public utility missions, such as the emergency medical transport of the sick, those with severe trauma, and organs for transplants, as well as for operations in favour of people in risky situations. This latter activity, given the imminent danger to the lives of the people being transported, demands a level of readiness twenty-four hours a day, 365 days a year.
