American Airlines to Send Names of Cancer Survivors Aloft in Charity Promotion

American Airlines has taken up skywriting, sort of, for charity.

People who donate at least $25 to the nonprofit Stand Up To Cancer, which funds medical research, can have the names of cancer survivors printed on an in-service American Airlines airplane.

The campaign is to last through July, and the Airbus A321 with the names on it will begin flying in September. The names will remain on the plane for at least two years. It will continue to fly with the Stand Up To Cancer logo after that.

Employees of the airline who are cancer survivors or are battling cancer can have their names, too, on the plane, with American Airlines paying the donations on their behalf.

The country-music singer Tim McGraw, who lost his father, Tug McGraw, to cancer in 2004, is lending his name to the campaign.

Donors will be able to go online to see the placement on the plane of the names they submitted.

Susannah Wesley-Ahlschwede, managing director of corporate communications for the airline, said the names would all be the same size, regardless of how much people give above the $25 minimum.

“The goal is to touch as many lives as possible,” she said.