The politics of turmoil: Overcoming global supply chain disruption

When word spread through social media that rebel factions in the Turkish Army had taken both bridges crossing the Bosporus, Ömer’s mind jumped to airfreight arriving at Istanbul’s Atatürk Airport and containers sitting on the docks at a port to the city’s south for which he was responsible.

“Containers were left on the dock, everything stopped, and all airfreight headed east by truck crosses those two bridges,” recalled the operations manager for an Istanbul-based freight forwarder, whose name has been changed.

This was not the first time the cosmopolitan city had been frozen in its tracks, even within the previous month. About two weeks earlier, on June 28, 2016, extremists supported by the ISIS terrorist organization had struck Atatürk Airport in Istanbul with automatic weapons and explosive belts, killing 45 people. And a few months prior to these attacks in Turkey, a dual bombing at Brussels Airport claimed 32 lives and caused extensive damage to the airport’s infrastructure.

Now, Ömer had a military coup to contend with as his company struggled to turn a profit in an already slow economy. But ultimately, Ömer and his colleagues were able to send of critical shipments, despite heightened uncertainty.

To some, it appeared that such political instability in Turkey and Belgium might cause lasting damage to the industry, especially as airfreight struggled with overcapacity and declining profits worldwide. However, airfreight operations at both Istanbul and Brussels airports demonstrated a remarkable resilience and were up and running in a matter of days. The Turkish coup was suppressed quickly and, although Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan seized the opportunity to consolidate his power, the resulting crackdown at least brought about a modicum of stability. In Brussels, the movement of passengers and cargo continued after a few days of cleanup and forensic investigation.

And while economic fallout depressed volumes in both cases, especially in Turkey, forwarders and other airports around the world’s political hotspots remain confident that airfreight will ride out a deteriorating global security climate.

It is important to note that most terror attacks directed at airports strike at passenger operations. Subsequently, security responses have emphasized increased security measures on the passenger side. However, airfreight is still interconnected with passenger traffic via bellyholds, so supply chain workers are also vulnerable to security threats.

While the recent spate of attacks is already spurring the aviation industry to adapt, it is merely an episode in an ongoing saga, where groups or individuals acting outside the law use air travel as a means to terrorize and disrupt everyday transactions. The first incident took place in 1955, when Jack Graham snuck a bomb into his mother’s luggage, causing a United Airlines plane to explode after takeoff from Denver, killing all 44 aboard. Instead of collecting her life insurance policy, as planned, Graham was convicted of murder and executed.

Ultimately, for every successful attack, many more are thwarted – such as the infamous printer cartridge bomb plot discovered in Yemen in 2010 – by the security apparatus that has been built up around airports. The latest rash of attacks across Europe shows how airfreight has largely avoided the turmoil faced on the passenger side, thus providing an interesting case study illustrating how a segment of the aviation business is able to overcome disruptions.

“Terrorism and air freight go a long way together,” said Philippe Fierens, director of freight forwarder and broker a.hartrodt: Belgium. “Our industry is used to dealing with these exceptional challenges.” But rather than leading to complacency, Fierens and his peers stress that, “recent events have shown that we need to continue our efforts,” which he notes is, “a difficult decision in a market with the lowest revenues since the last crisis of 2008.”