Amsterdam/Banda Aceh,
February
11, 2005
By donating a mobile rescue station, EADS is supporting the provision of medical care to the coastal region of Indonesia that has been devastated by floods. The station, which was developed and built by EADS Defence Electronics, will be set up at a reception camp for flood victims at Banda Aceh airport in Sumatra with the purpose of ensuring general medical treatment and emergency care to an outstanding medical and hygienic standard.
On Friday the German ambassador in Indonesia, Joachim Broudré-Gröger, handed over the rescue station to the Indonesian authorities in Banda Aceh. An EADS support team will accompany the setting-up of the station and will instruct the medical personnel. The rescue station consists of an air-conditioned medical container for basic medical treatment, vaccinations and emergency operations as well as a medical examination tent and a sluice facility for hygienic protection.
The donation is part of the EADS aid campaign to support Tsunami victims in Asia, which has been running since the beginning of January. Altogether the European group provides help worth of about € 2 million. As well as making a donation of at least € 1 million in cash to the aid organizations working in the region, EADS is also supporting the rescue and rebuilding operations through various means of assistance. An Airbus Beluga mega-transporter has brought relief supplies and helicopters into the region. Several Eurocopter helicopters are participating in rescue and recovery operations in Thailand, Indonesia and Malaysia. In addition, EADS is supplying aid and task forces with digital radio equipment and has offered to deploy a Socata TBM 700 ambulance aircraft. The company's Space section is providing satellite images of the region. Furthermore, EADS has called on its employees to make personal donations to a special account. The sum of donations received to support the flood victims will at least be doubled by the company itself.
Philippe Camus and Rainer Hertrich, the CEOs of EADS, commented on this, saying: "Following our support in the form of logistic aid to alleviate the acute distress, by donating the rescue station we now wish to make a lasting contribution to the direct basic medical care of the population in the particularly badly affected region of Banda Aceh. As a globally active company, we see it as our duty to help, both through financial means and through active commitment in the region."
EADS is a world leader in the markets for aerospace and defence products and related services, having achieved revenues amounting to € 30.1 billion with a workforce of roughly 109,000 in the year 2003. The EADS Group includes the aircraft manufacturer Airbus, the world's largest helicopter supplier Eurocopter and the joint venture MBDA, the second largest guided missile producer in the global market. EADS is the major partner in the Eurofighter consortium, is the prime contractor for the Ariane launcher, develops the A400M military transport aircraft and is the largest industrial partner for the European satellite navigation system Galileo.
