Turkish Cargo has completed a charter flight transporting a shipment of live fish from Turkey to Oman.

According to Turkish, approximately 1.5 million live Gilt-head breams weighing 100 tonnes were loaded onto a Boeing 777F and flown from Izmir to Oman, accompanied by aquaculture engineers. The pH balance, oxygen and water temperature levels of had to be checked every hour.

“The live fish of 100 tonnes were required to be transported to Oman from Bodrum in a maximum period of 40 hours,” said Turhan Ozen, chief cargo officer at Turkish Airlines. “They were first taken to trucks and carried to Izmir in three hours upon completion of the initial preparations, and then they were loaded in our freighter equipped with special techniques by our cargo-handling officers. They were carried to Oman from Izmir in three hours, so we were able to carry them within 24 hours in total. We accomplished this operation by means of our Boeing 777F type freighter in accordance with IATA Live Animals Regulations, reinforcing our success in transportation of live animals requiring an utmost level of care. Carrying 1.5 million live fish by means of a freighter requires accurate air-conditioning, and expertise in oxygen and temperature checks. Furthermore, this carriage operation fell under the status of transportation of dangerous goods due to the oxygen cylinders utilized. We could provide the environment required for health of the fish, and meet the requirements of the operation thanks to our expert team and the assurance by Turkish Cargo. We, as Turkish Cargo, will keep standing by the Turkish exporters at all times.”

The fish were grown in the Aegean by Kilic Holding, a Turkish company.

“We are standing as the only company performing sea fish imports operations from Turkey,” said Serkan Ilgaz, executive vice president of production at Kilic Holding. “We carried approximately 1.5 million baby gilt-head breams to the Indian Ocean off the coast of Oman in shorter than 40 hours, and performed our first shipment with Turkish Cargo. We hope to keep developing our cooperation with our flag-carrier airline in the new achievements in future.”

Turkish Cargo also supports the transportation of live fish from countries such as Tunisia, Oman, Qatar and Saudi Arabia.

The cargo division of Turkish Airlines has a network consisting of 121 countries and operates a freighter fleet of one Airbus A300-600F, three A310-300Fs, nine A330-200Fs, two 747-400Fs and two 777Fs, with three more 777Fs on order.