United Nations Humanitarian Air Service

The United Nations Humanitarian Air Service (UNHAS), created in 2003 at the request of the United Nations High Level Committee on Management, managed by the World Food Programme (WFP), provides common air services, including light cargo transport for the wider humanitarian community to and from areas of crisis and intervention. In most countries requiring humanitarian assistance, surface travel is impeded by challenging security situations, long distances and poor road conditions. Furthermore, most of the destinations the humanitarian community needs to reach are not served by adequate commercial air operators. When no other means of reaching isolated communities are available, aid workers can rely on UNHAS to provide access.[2]

"UNHAS" redirects here. For the Indonesian University known as Unhas, see Hasanuddin University. For the singular, see unha (disambiguation).
United Nations Humanitarian Air Service
A map showing active UNHAS Operations of 2021
IATA ICAO Callsign
- UNO UNITED NATIONS
Founded2003 (2003)[1]
Fleet size75
Destinations310
Parent company(World Food Programme)
United Nations
Websitewww.wfp.org/unhas

To fulfill its mission, UNHAS uses a fleet of 75 aircraft and helicopters chartered from commercial air operators that are compliant with the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) Standards and Recommended Practices (SARP) and the United Nations Aviation Standards for Peacekeeping and Humanitarian Air Transport Operations (UNAVSTADS).[3]

Chartered aircraft are fully dedicated to UNHAS operations. Therefore, contracted air carriers are assured of revenue in terms of guaranteed aircraft utilization for the duration of the contract. This, along with UNHAS' efficient management of schedules, ensures that partner air carriers avoid taking undue risks to achieve financial gains. For example, in the event of a flight cancellation due to poor weather conditions, the air carrier would not be financially penalized.

UNHAS operations

In 2021 UNHAS provided passenger and light cargo services in 23 countries[3]

Fleet

To fulfil its mission, UNHAS uses a fleet of 75 aircraft, of which 59 are fixed-wing aircraft and 16 are rotary-wing aircraft.[3]

Aircraft Area of Operation Variant Notes
Fixed-wing Aircraft
Airbus A320-211  Yemen A320-200
Beechcraft 1900  Afghanistan,  Chad,  DRC,  Equatorial Guinea,  Guinea,  Mali,  Mauritania,  Somalia,  Sudan 1900D
Bombardier CRJ  DRC,  Syria CRJ100/200
Cessna 208 Caravan  Cameroon,  CAR,  Chad,  DRC,  Ethiopia,  Madagascar,  Somalia,  Sudan
De Havilland Canada 6  Haiti
De Havilland Canada Dash 8  Afghanistan,  CAR,  DRC, Ethiopia,  Kenya,  Niger,  Somalia,  South Sudan,  Yemen 100/200/400
Dornier 228  CAR,  DRC,  Mali,  South Sudan
Dornier 328  Nigeria
Embraer 145  Afghanistan,  Cameroon,  Chad,  Libya,  Niger,  Sudan,  Yemen ERJ135/ERJ145
Fokker 50  Somalia
Ilyushin IL-76  South Sudan
Let L-410  CAR,  Mozambique,  South Sudan
Rotary-wing Aircraft
Airbus EC225  Nigeria Used in Northeast Nigeria for security and medical transport[3]
Bell 412  Nigeria
Mi-8  Afghanistan,  Burkina Faso,  CAR,  DRC,  Haiti,  South Sudan, Yemen MI-8T
MI-8MTV/AMT

Performance

In 2021, UNHAS transported 325,112 passengers alongside 5,862 mt of humanitarian cargo and food to 496 destinations (including ad hoc) in 23 countries. Additionally, 3,015 evacuations were carried out during this year, including security relocations, medical evacuations (including those of COVID-19).[3]

Funding

WFP/UNHAS is funded by contributions from donors and money realized from a partial cost recovery scheme through which passengers pay ticket fees for the air service.

The UNHAS donors in 2021 were: Canada, Czech Republic, Denmark, the European Union, France, Germany, Ireland, Italy, Japan, Korea, Luxembourg, Monaco, Norway, Qatar, Romania, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, the United Kingdom, UNICEF, the United States, the United Nations itself and Private Donors.[3]

References
  1. "Point sur le Service aérien d'aide humanitaire des Nations Unies". World Food Programme. June 20–24, 2022. Retrieved 2023-02-04.
  2. "Chapter 6: Flying Humanitarians: The UN Humanitarian Air Service - UN Air Power: Wings for Peace". unairpower.net. Retrieved 2018-11-07.
  3. "United Nations Humanitarian Air Service (UNHAS) Annual Review 2021". UNHAS Annual Review. 13 May 2022.
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