Michael Brunton, Managing Director of Host Sytems commented: “The US military did a good job to get the airport operational with a temporary caravan supplied by the FAA which had never been out of the United States.  They lost precious time when they had to wait for a Russian Antonov plane to collect and transport their unit to Port au Prince and in their deployment time.   Their temporary system arrived on 23 January and took a while to be made fully operational.” 

“The Host Systems tower is transportable by Il-76 or C-130 and we could have had our tower in Haiti on 20th January, and operational within an hour of arrival using our highly experienced team who would travel with the tower” said Michael Brunton, MD of Host Systems.   

“I have been in disaster situations where ATC has been destroyed and have seen for myself that the delay in receiving aid costs lives. It is vital to the humanitarian effort to have effective ATC in place to enable urgent deliveries by air and this is why we developed the Host Systems Mobile ATC Tower; it is air transportable, rapidly deployed, elevates to an operator height of 7m and can be a long term solution rather than a quick fix. Our systems are specially designed for this application and not a converted vehicle.” 

Each disaster highlights different logistical problems but in Port Au Prince it is the ATC – being only a small airport it is not capable of handling the large amount of aid planes especially on the ground, the temporary unit does not elevate meaning the control of aircraft, vehicles and people is made even more difficult, especially in a confined area. 

Michael went on to say: “We notified our government and aid agencies that we have a tower still available for Haiti or for Chile and are hoping that the authorities may consider using one of our towers in the re-building program for Haiti.  We propose that our mobile tower is a safer long term option than a conventionally built tower in an earthquake region.