An Cosantóir

20 the port side of the aircraft, embedded into the hillside, a noticeable patriotic slogan in Mandarin proclaims: "Be loyal to Chairman Mao". From this point to the eastern border with Mongolia the topography is very similar to that of Spain's interior. Approaching the border with Mongolia we were flying over high desert with great expanses of dusty plains between the few towns en-route. Ulaanbataar, that nation's capital, is sited in a green valley between two mountain outcrops. The airport there has a south-east facing runway with an unusually steep up-slope. Continuing westwards as we flew over the Alti mountain range again, this time towards Siberia, the tiredness factor became more noticeable and over the following five hours there were quite a few changes of the operating pilots. There was a short but formal handover of command of the aircraft from Commander B to the Relief Commander, and later on to Commander A. Having rested, Commander B then resumed his position for the remainder of the flight. Despite our familiarity with each other, clear articulation of operating responsibility, roles and rest periods were essential. A physiological pleasantry of these flights was that, if I needed to exercise cramped muscles after say 6 or 8 hours in the cockpit, I handed over control and went for a walk taking in the full length of the aircraft. This is quite a novelty because on a regular passenger flight there are security implications against such a stroll around the cabin. The return journey initially re-traced the outward flight westwards as far as Ulaanbataar but from there until the east of Scotland we flew a much more northerly route. There are two reasons for this: going to China, the Russian authorities allocated a specific entry point to their airspace for our flights and this was south of St Petersburg bordering eastern Estonia, but for the return flight the exit point was not so crucial and, so as to take advantage of a shorter distance over the earth and a lesser strength of headwind, we now had the option to fly at a higher latitude coming home. Taking the route of a higher latitude reduced both the flight time and fuel-burn on the return to Dublin. Across Mongolia and Russia, from Ulaanbataar to Krasnoyarsk to Niznevartovsk to Surgut and then just south of Archangelesk on the White Sea to northern Europe we went. Leaving Russia behind us as we flew over Northern Karelia and, on transferring to Finnish air traffic control, the unanimous feeling amongst the crew was that we were home. I noticed on these westbound flights especially that the summer weather over Finland and Sweden was extraordinarily good whereas Norway had a more typically West of Ireland summer. Our reception at Dublin Airport was always enthusiastic and professionally brisk as the Aer Lingus loading teams transferred the PPE cargo to the Army Logistics for transport and distribution to the HSE and frontline medical personnel. As we walked away from the A330, feeling weary and fighting the powerful impetus to sleep, it was indeed a feeling of satisfaction to known that we had achieved something that aided the great lifesavers of the front line in their fight against the beast COVID-19. A member of the Defence Forces using PPE outside the Aviva Stadium Covid - 19 test Centre MY EXPERIENCE OF THE AER LINGUS PPE AIRLIFT FROM CHINA

• Cover