United to continue Civil Air Reserve humanitarian flights

United Airlines will continue flying humanitarian missions as part of the Civil Reserve Air Fleet (CRAF) “over the next several days at least”, the carrier says. The airline and other US carriers have deployed jets under the US government’s CRAF programme in support of evacuations from Afghanistan. United says on 24 August that one Boeing 777-300 with 340 military personnel, civilians and Afghan evacuees landed at Washington’s Dulles International airport from Ramstein Air Base in Germany on 23 August. “We’ve had more than 8,000 United employees come forward looking to assist with these missions just over the last few days,” United says. These include pilots, flight attendants, technicians, employees who speak Dari, Farsi and Pashtu – languages native to Afghanistan and the region. This is only the third time in history that civil carriers have been asked to assist on a military evacuation operation. <br/>