Afghanistan: Woman gives birth on board US evacuation flight
C-17 military aircraft forced to descend to lower altitude to increase air pressure ‘which helped stabilise and save mother’s life’ after she suffered complications
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An Afghan woman has given birth on board an evacuation flight taking people from Kabul to Germany.
The US air force C-17 plane was flying from the Middle East to Ramstein air base near the border with France when the unnamed woman went into labour.
US Air Mobility Command (AMC), which provides airlift and aeromedical evacuations, tweeted that the woman had given birth inside the cargo bay of the aircraft before being transported to hospital.
Both the mother and baby girl are in “good condition”, they said.
“During a flight from an intermediate staging base in the Middle East, the mother went into labour and began having complications,” the AMC said in a statement.
“The aircraft commander decided to descend in altitude to increase air pressure in the aircraft, which helped stabilise and save the mother’s life.”
The statement continued: “Upon landing, airmen from the 86th MDG came aboard and delivered the child in the cargo bay of the aircraft.
“The baby girl and mother were transported to a nearby medical facility and are in good condition.”
Ramstein air base is being used as a transit post for people being evacuated from Afghanistan.
Evacuations are continuing, though some outgoing flights from Kabul have been far from full because of the airport chaos, Taliban checkpoints, and bureaucratic challenges.
A German flight on Friday night carried 172 evacuees, but two subsequent flights carried out just seven and eight people respectively.
The Pentagon said on Sunday that it was formally seeking help from commercial airlines to relocate evacuees from Afghanistan once they have left the country.
The initial stage of the Civil Reserve Air Fleet programme has been activated, which includes a request for 18 aircraft: three each from American Airlines, Atlas Air, Delta Air Lines and Omni Air; two from Hawaiian Airlines; and four from United Airlines.
The aircraft will not fly into Hamid Karzai international airport in Kabul; rather they will be used to move passengers from other airports in the region and elsewhere in the world once they leave Kabul, allowing the US military to focus on the Afghanistan portion of the evacuation.
Additional reporting by agencies
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