IAG Cargo has extended its Critical product to cover Constant Climate shipments, enabling emergency medical shipments to benefit from the carrier’s highest-priority service.

According to IAG, shippers sending urgent pharmaceuticals now have access to the non-offloadable status and performance guarantees offered under the Critical product.

“We are proud of the significant investment that we continue to make into our Constant Climate product and the infrastructure that supports it,” said Alan Dorling, global head of pharmaceuticals and life sciences at IAG Cargo. “We were one of the first carriers to offer a dedicated pharmaceutical shipment product and today our teams across the world deliver the highest level of care and expertise when transporting high-value, temperature-sensitive goods. The development of Constant Climate Critical means that we are now able to build on our offering by providing vital vaccines and emergency lifesaving medicines with a non-offloadable status. In addition to our highest priority grading, the product continues to safeguard temperature-specific shipment requirements, maintaining the purity, potency and stability of the lifesaving medicines that we carry.”

Following successful trials of Constant Climate Critical across India, the UK and Europe, IAG Cargo is now rolling out the new offering across all 109 Constant Climate stations in its network.

“Critical has been a real success; demand has come from right across our network and week on week we see both new requests and repeat business,” said David Shepherd, commercial director at IAG Cargo. “We know that there is a real demand for guaranteed capacity and a must-fly service for urgent pharmaceutical products and it is crucial that we continue to innovate to ensure that we meet our customers’ needs.”

IAG expects Constant Climate Critical to be popular across key pharmaceutical trade lanes, such as from manufacturing hubs in India and Europe into burgeoning pharmaceutical markets such as Latin America. The service offers guaranteed capacity up to the maximum aircraft operating limit and a dedicated monitoring service through hubs at London Heathrow, Madrid and Dublin. The Heathrow and Madrid hubs also offer a dedicated Critical check-in desk to speed up drop-off and collection times.

The Critical product was launched in September 2016 and has already carried over 2,000 emergency shipments, such as pre-launch consumer electronic devices, Formula One tyres and factory machine parts, according to IAG Cargo.