Home Publisher's Message CAN Can. Can You?

CAN Can. Can You?

More than 10,000 of world’s finest athletes from 207 countries will gather in Rio de Janeiro in August for the XXXI Olympiad to determine who is the swiftest, strongest, and most skilled in 306 events. While the broadcast and internet coverage will be continual, the chances are good that you and many other BAA readers will be there in person, hoping to see both Olympic and world records broken.

Not waiting for the Olympics, one reader already has set a “world record.” On April 14, an NCR-owned Bombardier Challenger 300 departed the Meridian FBO at New Jersey’s Teterboro Airport for Atlanta, Georgia. As a member of the Corporate Angel Network (CAN), NCR’s record-setting flight was CAN’s 50,000th cancer patient transport flight. Onboard with NCR executives were one-year-old Baron Yerby and his parents Casey and Jonathan. Baron had just been treated at Memorial Sloan Kettering in New York City for retinoblastoma, a cancer that targets young children.

Since 1981, CAN has been arranging to fly patients to specialized treatment at major medical centers in the empty seats of corporate jets– seats provided to patients and their families at no cost.

Today, the CAN team includes more than 500 of America’s top corporations (including half of the Fortune 100), a small paid staff, and more than 30 part-time volunteers who work with patients, families, physicians, and leading treatment centers to coordinate medical travel needs with the scheduled flight activity of those participating corporations.

CAN currently is able to fly more than half the patients they register. That’s almost 250 cancer patient flights every month. But CAN needs more aircraft and crews to provide more seats to meet the additional 46% of transport requests.

Quite Simply, CAN Needs YOU.

Getting involved is easy. There are neither costs nor minimum flight commitments. All patients are ambulatory and able to climb the steps of a corporate jet unassisted (or are babies in their parents’ arms), and have medical clearance to fly from their doctor. Each corporate CAN member always has the option to decline a flight request.

In business aviation, an industry that’s had more than its fair share of black eyes, CAN provides an opportunity for business aircraft owners go above and beyond – literally – in their philanthropic commitments.

As a longtime supporter of the Corporate Angel Network, I invite you to join me. To find out how an unused seat on your aircraft can make a tough journey for someone like little Baron Yerby that much easier, visit: www.corpangelnetwork.org. On behalf of Baron, and the next 50,000 patients, thank you. BAA

Publisher of Business Aviation Advisor, has nearly 50 years in business aviation including executive positions at aircraft management/charter and ground services companies. He is a past director of the NATA and Corporate Angel Network.

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