Co-op considered using ex-military cargo plane to get food into Jersey

Co-op considered using ex-military cargo plane to get food into Jersey

The Commodore Clipper and Commodore Goodwill, which both bring food to the Island from the UK, suffered serious disruption during the recent storms.

Some shops began to restock on Thursday after the Commodore Goodwill managed to dock on Wednesday night. Further supplies were expected to arrive on Thursday, allowing more shops to fill their shelves.

The Co-op’s chief operating officer, Mark Cox, said: ‘We rely on both the day and night ferries to deliver products to our 14 outlets in Jersey – it does take time and my colleagues have been working overtime to stock the shelves once the products arrived.’

He added that amid the period of disruption, the company began to talk to their UK colleagues about chartering an ex-military Hercules cargo plane to bring supplies into the Island.

‘We were really starting to chew our fingernails over that – there was a lot less available than normal on the shelves and if we could not get the products in for three consecutive days, then we would have had to start looking at that [using the Hercules].’

He added: ‘On Tuesday morning, based on the forecast and what Condor were telling us, we realised that it would not be necessary.

‘It is obviously quite an expensive exercise and due to the size of the aircraft we would have had to make some key strategic decisions about what to bring in.’

No one from SandpiperCI was available for comment.

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