Thunder Airlines expanding.

Airline increases services, seeks new opportunities

Thunder Airlines is spreading its wings. The Thunder Bay-based airline company has already expanded its air-ambulance service in Timmins by buying out Canada Airmed, and continues to look for new opportunities inside and outside of Ontario.

"(Thunder Airlines) bought out a company called Airmed, which had a base (in Timmins), in early 2000," Ken Bittle, president of Thunder Airlines says. "We have increased our service there from a 12-hour-during-the-day service to a 24-hour, seven-day-a-week service for air ambulance. That took place (in June of this year). There's the potential for some other expansion there, but we're waiting for some feedback from the government on that aspect."

Thunder Airlines, offering air ambulance, air charter and air cargo service throughout Ontario and across the country, has an eight-person flight crew and eight paramedics currently working for its Timmins hangar. Bittle says he has known for sometime that 24-hour service for the area was needed, and that more staff was called for.

Because of the size of the geographic area, he says there were many night calls that Thunder Airlines could not accommodate.

"If you're operating during the day, for instance, the flight crew that flies during the day can't also fly at night. So if you have an air-ambulance call at night, if you've flown during the day, you can't do it," Bittle says. "We have felt for some time that there was a call for night work as well as day work and we are in the process of enhancing what we have there now to provide 24-hour advanced life support. We already have advanced life support (in Timmins), but it's not 24 hours a day. So we're in the process of lining up some other staff."

Thunder Air's biggest client continues to be the Ontario Ministry of Health, which calls on Thunder Air to transport patients between hospitals in Canada and the United States when its own dedicated equipment is unavailable. Other clients include Bell Canada, Hydro One, First Nations communities and federal and provincial agencies and ministries. Thunder Airlines is the only air ambulance charter company in Canada to offer advanced inflight paramedic care.

Bittle says each of its clients can now be better served with expanded hours in Timmins and more advanced-care level paramedics.

"It's a fairly complex task to get paramedics who are properly trained and then approved by the hospital, which in this case is Sunnybrook Hospital in Toronto."

He says officials with Thunder Airlines were in Timmins this spring to recruit graduates from Northern College, but most of the students coming out of the college are not at the advanced-paramedic level.

"The students we talked to are going to be advanced-care paramedics at some point, so we wanted to make contact for the future, too."

Bittle says the company continues to explore new ways to expand, but says details of any pending arrangements have not yet been announced.

"We have some plans, but it's a very competitive marketplace, so we're not disclosing them right at the moment. We do have another location that will be activated later this year."