Air evacuation pod for coronavirus patients developed by Navy

Kochi, Apr 15: The Indian Navy's Naval Aircraft Yard here has developed a smart evacuation pod for evacuation of Covid-19 patients safely from remote areas such as islands and ships. The indigenously designed and fabricated an Air Evacuation Pod (AEP) will help the evacuation team to safely shift coronavirus-infected persons from ships and islands in a fully sealed patient transfer capsule.

There will be no risk of cross-infection to pilots and evacuation team using the pod with no requirement of sanitation of aircraft post evacuation, a Defence spokesman said here.

The evacuation pod was designed under guidance of Principal Medical Officer of the naval air station here, INS Garuda in consultation with specialist from the naval hospital INHS Sanjivani and Head Quarters of Southern Naval Command, the spokesperson said.

It is made of aluminium, nitrile rubber and perspex.

The highlight of the pod is that it weighs only 32 kg and has incurred a manufacturing cost of Rs 50,000 which is only 0.1 per cent of cost of an imported equivalent (Rs 59 lakh), the spokesman said.

"Trials of patients inside AEP were undertaken on board Advance Light Helicopter (ALH) and Dornier aircraft of Indian Navy at Southern Naval Command and successfully completed on April 8. Twelve AEPs are planned for distribution across Southern, Western, Eastern and Andaman and Nicobar Naval commands," the spokesman said.

The successful induction of the AEP will vastly increase the Indian Navy's abilities in its relentless efforts towards aiding Covid-19 prevention across the nation, the spokesman added.