June 12th is Transportation Aviation Day and also one of its most famous missions: the first flight of the CAN
Air Force Agency, by Lieutenant Susanna Scarlet
On June 12, is celebrated the Transport Aviation Day, a branch of the Brazilian Air Force, responsible for integrating the national territory, with connections, sometimes, all over the world. The date also commemorates one of its most famous missions: the first flight of the CAN.
The beginning of the history of Transport Aviation goes hand in hand with the first flight of the National Air Mail (CAN), in 1931, when the mission of transporting a package of mail from Rio de Janeiro to São Paulo by Lieutenants Casimiro Montenegro Filho and Nélson Freire Lavenère-Wanderley, aboard the Curtiss Fledgling, registration K263, made possible the dream and the project of progress of the men of that time. [Click here to download the original image]
In all, the FAB currently has 13 Air Units that act in Transport Aviation, based in Manaus (AM), Belém (PA), Parnamirim (RN), Rio de Janeiro (RJ), Canoas (RS), Campo Grande (MS), Anápolis (GO) and Brasilia (DF). For the missions, the squadrons use the KC-30, KC-390 Millennium, C-130 Hercules, C-105 Amazonas, C-99, C-97 Brasilia, C-98 Caravan, C-95 Bandeirante and U-100 Phenom aircraft, thus fulfilling the mission in its full scope.
National Air Mail (Correio Aéreo Nacional – CAN)
Currently, the Air Force has 25 CAN Posts, distributed throughout the country, and 4 Logistic Transportation Terminals. And for those who imagine that the role of the FAB is limited to protecting Brazilian airspace, it is worth knowing that many other missions are carried out, such as organ transport, cargo transport, transfer of sick and wounded who need urgent care, help fighting forest fires, humanitarian aid, animal transport, interiorization of immigrants, among many other missions.
The Chief of the Courses Section and Chief of the Legislation Section of the Aeronautics Logistic Transportation Center (CTLA), Captain Genison da Cruz Barcellos, recalled another benefit practiced by the National Air Mail: the meeting of people who live far away. “The importance of the activities developed by CAN is not only in governmental issues, in public calamities, in FAB logistics, or in the logistics of other singular Forces and other agencies”, highlighted the Captain.
