Reflections on My First Year as President and CEO of Airlink
By: Paloma Adams-Allen, President and CEO, Airlink
When disaster strikes, we often see images of first responders searching for survivors, healthcare workers treating patients, and humanitarian organizations delivering food, water, and shelter. What we rarely see is the extraordinary effort required to get those responders and essential supplies where they need to be.
This is the untold story of humanitarian response: logistics. Far from being a behind-the-scenes function, logistics can determine whether a response happens at all. A medical team cannot save lives if it cannot reach an affected community. Emergency supplies sitting in a warehouse cannot help families who urgently need them.
A year ago, I joined Airlink as President and CEO with a conviction shaped by years of public service and my childhood experiences in rural Jamaica, living through hurricanes, tropical storms, and seasonal flooding firsthand: when disaster strikes, the speed of help can determine who survives. I saw in Airlink a model for the future of humanitarian response, one that brings together the expertise of nonprofit organizations with the resources and reach of the aviation and logistics industries to deliver lifesaving assistance.
One year and 70 responses later, that conviction has only grown stronger. But I have also learned something equally important: effective humanitarian logistics requires more than access to the fastest modes of transportation; it depends on strong relationships, shared purpose, and, above all, trust.
Paloma Adams-Allen at Airlink’s inaugural Global Partner Forum in Washington, D.C.
“Our strength lies in bringing together and multiplying the impact of partners with different capabilities and a shared commitment to humanitarian response.“
The power of trusted partnerships
Airlink occupies a unique space in the humanitarian ecosystem. We don’t own aircraft, trucks, or ships, nor do we directly distribute humanitarian assistance to affected communities. Instead, we mobilize aviation and logistics resources to help humanitarian organizations get lifesaving personnel and supplies onto planes, ships, trains, and trucks, and ultimately into communities where they are needed, often at no cost to our nonprofit partners.
Our strength lies in bringing together and multiplying the impact of partners with different capabilities and a shared commitment to humanitarian response. For aviation and logistics companies, Airlink provides a trusted pathway to put their assets and expertise to work helping people through some of the worst days of their lives. For nonprofits, we help overcome transportation barriers and reduce logistics costs, freeing up their resources to invest directly in affected communities. For donors, we turn generosity into action. And for communities, our work supports their priorities and efforts to respond, recover, save lives and livelihoods, and rebuild.
Making these partnerships work for the good of humanity requires more than securing space on an aircraft. It means navigating airport and road closures, customs requirements, and other logistical challenges. Humanitarian partners count on us to move their responders and supplies; aviation partners trust us to use their resources responsibly; and donors rely on us to put their contributions to good use. Crucially, we must listen to the people, organizations, and communities living through disasters and crises. Their knowledge and leadership are essential to an effective response.
These relationships cannot be built overnight or improvised in the middle of a disaster.
Consider Airlink’s ongoing response to the Ebola outbreak in the Democratic Republic of Congo. Working alongside our longtime partner, the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies (IFRC), Airlink sent its first shipment of medical supplies just days after the outbreak was confirmed in late May. This shipment contained safe and dignified burial kits that help prevent the spread of the disease while allowing families to honor their loved ones. The supplies reached Bunia, at the heart of the outbreak, just 11 days after it was declared, delivering surge supplies in half the time it took during IFRC’s previous Ebola response in the country.
Another example is our first-of-its-kind collaboration with Amazon in response to the Venezuela earthquakes. With the country’s largest airport damaged and commercial flights disrupted, getting aid to communities already facing economic hardship and displacement posed enormous challenges.
With no commercial pathway to send aid by air, Airlink and Amazon found a workaround: Airlink would consolidate our partners’ aid cargo and use a dedicated Amazon aircraft to get it into the country via a seven-week air bridge—a series of coordinated flights—to deliver essential food, shelter, hygiene supplies, and medical aid. Together, we delivered more than 300 tons of aid supplies for some 1.5 million people in need.
Left image: Medical supplies from the International Federation of the Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies (IFRC) arriving to prevent the spread of Ebola in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC).
Right image: Aid cargo being loaded onto an air bridge flight with Airlink, Amazon, the U.S. State Department, and the World Food Programme for the Venezuela earthquakes.
What we have accomplished together
In 2025, Airlink’s team of just over 20 people worked alongside more than 100 humanitarian partners, over 25 aviation and logistics companies, and public and private donors to support relief efforts reaching more than 15 million people.
Since October 2025, we have worked together to deploy over 2,100 emergency responders and transport more than 1,900 metric tons of humanitarian supplies to communities in crisis in 63 countries across 70 responses. Our partners supported search and rescue efforts, restored essential services, provided emergency shelter, and helped communities begin rebuilding. Airlink’s support generated more than $14 million in airlift and transportation value, allowing humanitarian organizations to direct more resources toward assistance and recovery.
Behind these numbers are families finding food and shelter, healthcare teams caring for the sick and injured, and communities working to recover.
The need for this work is growing. At the start of the year, more than 240 million people worldwide were projected to require aid in 2026, a figure that has only grown amid new disease outbreaks, conflicts, and natural disasters. Airlink has experienced a 50% increase in demand for our free-of-charge transportation and logistics services as humanitarian organizations confront rising needs, resource constraints, and increasingly complex emergencies.
An airline executive recently shared something that has stayed with me. Their pilots were so eager to participate in humanitarian missions that they would debate who would get to fly the aircraft carrying relief supplies.
I love this story because it reminds me that people don’t want to stand on the sidelines when others are suffering. They want to put their skills and resources to work. For businesses, these partnerships go beyond philanthropy. They are also an investment in the resilience of communities where their employees, customers, and families live and work.
Left image: Anand Stanley, President of Airbus Asia-Pacific, Paloma Adams-Allen, and Airlink’s Stephanie Steege at the Airbus Singapore Campus.
Right image: Paloma Adams-Allen packing hygiene kits from Good360 with GE Aerospace for communities impacted by the earthquakes in Venezuela and Colombia.
“But our ambition isn’t simply to respond to more disasters. It’s to be better prepared for them.”
Preparing together for what comes next
My vision for Airlink’s future is bold: to reach twice as many people in the coming years as we do today. That means deepening our relationships across aviation and logistics, engaging new businesses and donors, and strengthening collaboration with humanitarian organizations, especially local partners in the US and around the world who know their communities best.
But our ambition isn’t simply to respond to more disasters. It’s to be better prepared for them. That means anticipating emerging crises, expanding our aviation and transportation capacity, strengthening our global operational readiness, and building trusted partnerships focused on resilience long before the next crisis strikes.
I don’t yet know every step of the path. But I know the destination, and I know and trust the people walking it with me. I am deeply grateful to Airlink’s extraordinary team, our board, partners, donors, and volunteers for all we have accomplished together this past year.
To those already working alongside us, let’s deepen our collaboration. And to those who have yet to join us, I invite you to bring your expertise, resources, and commitment to this shared mission. The next disaster will come. Let’s make sure we are ready, together, before it does.
Top banner image: Paloma Adams-Allen (left) with United Airlines’ B.J. Youngerman at the Engage for Good Halo Awards.
About Airlink
Airlink is a global humanitarian nonprofit organization delivering critical aid to communities in crisis by providing free or discounted airlift and logistical solutions to vetted nonprofit partners, changing how the humanitarian community responds to disasters worldwide. Its network includes over 250 humanitarian organizations and over 50 commercial and charter airlines. Since its inception in 2010, Airlink has flown 15,000 relief workers and transported 8,100 metric tons of humanitarian cargo, directly helping 75 million people impacted by disasters. Visit airlinkflight.org and follow us on LinkedIn, Threads, and Instagram.