GMR Hyderabad Air Cargo (GHAC) on Tuesday handled a major import shipment of Russian made Sputnik V vaccines.
The vaccine consignment arrived from Russia on a specially chartered freighter RU-9450 which touched down at Hyderabad Airport at 0343 hours, a release here said.
While GHAC has already handled several import shipments of vaccine prior to this, today’s shipment of 56.6 tonnes of vaccines is the single largest import shipment of COVID-19 vaccines handled in India till date. This shipment completed all processes and was dispatched in less than 90 minutes.
The Sputnik V vaccine requires specialized handling and storage, requiring to be kept at a temperature of -20° C.
GHAC has been working closely with the experts from the customer’s supply chain team, officials from customs department and other relevant stakeholders over an extended period of time to ensure that the necessary infrastructure and handling processes are fully in place at the Air Cargo Terminal for smooth handling of the vaccine shipments.
With the smooth handling of this large vaccine import consignment, GHAC has further cemented its position as the largest vaccine import hub for India.
Major pharma companies based in and around Hyderabad are expected to produce or import over 3.5 billion doses of different varieties of COVID vaccines over the next couple of years and GHAC has been gearing up on all fronts to handle the surge in vaccine shipments, the release added.
