Airport operators move cargo off airport, prioritize growing workforce to avoid congestion

Cargo that ends up in limbo in on-airport warehouses is exacerbating the congestion crisis, but quickly moving cargo off airport and building a workforce sufficient to meet the handling needs are keys to efficient operations at major airports, panelists said during today’s Air Cargo World webinar “Thinking outside the terminal: Cargo airports of the future.” [caption id="attachment_97499" align="alignright" width="450"] Panelists during the Air Cargo World webinar “Thinking outside the terminal: Cargo airports of the future.”[/caption] “When it’s a multi-tenant facility, the poor ground handlers are sitting there seeing more flights coming in and there’s no plan for how to handle these,” said Shawn McWhorter, president for NCA Americas with Nippon Cargo Airlines, said during the discussion. “I know they’re being told by their airline customers ‘we’re bringing in three more flights tomorrow, find a way to handle it,’ but if the infrastructure is not there to handle it, there’s no managed process for what happens once it gets there.” The result, McWhorter noted, is what occurred at Chicago O’Hare (ORD) in October — “so many pallets of cargo simply sitting on the ramp because the warehouses are full.” NCA has avoided the worst of the congestion by avoiding common use space in warehouses at the U.S. airports where it operates and using dedicated handlers, McWhorter said, but he noted that “it’s not the cheapest way to operate.” While moving cargo off airport adds more trucking requirements, it is a common practice that can avoid the worst of the congestion. “We have automated bypasses in place so we can quickly transport the cargo off the airport and return it to the forwarder within an hour and a half of walk-in, and it doesn’t create the congestion problem. So when these facilities are designed and the airports are thinking about the flow, is there a way to quickly get the intact cargo off the airport? Because it’s the loose, breakdown cargo that causes most of the congestion,” McWhorter said. Planning starts upstream — NCA has encouraged the use of intact units for the imports it receives from Asia. Overwhelmed infrastructure at major airports is often a result of local geography that prohibits further expansion, but even airports without geographic restrictions can be overwhelmed by the sheer volume of cargo arriving daily. “The airfield is not the issue, it becomes more of a manpower issue in terms of the workforce,” said Bobby Spann, vice president of external affairs at Cincinnati/Northern Kentucky International Airport (CVG). “What we’ve been doing as an airport group is working with all the vendors and the tenants on the airport property to develop a workforce collaborative that will help recruit and bring the people in to fill these jobs that are being created.” Cargo operations at CVG are dominated by the two hubs of DHL Express and Amazon Air, and according to Spann, over the past 36 months DHL has nearly doubled its workforce at the airport. Many U.S. facilities are in need of redevelopment, and leading cargo hubs overseas offer potential lessons for more efficient operations. Space is limited at Amsterdam (AMS) and Hong Kong (HKG) airports, so operators there have turned to creative design and technology improvements, according to panelists. “We don’t have a lot of square meters available in Amsterdam, so we’ll have to do things smarter,” said Anne Marie van Hemert, senior manager aviation business development at AMS. The airport has focused on digitalization and cooperation among stakeholders, and has implemented digital pre-notification, which helps make throughput more predictable. Hong Kong Air Cargo Terminals Ltd (Hactl), the largest independent handler at HKG, has likewise invested in digital initiatives, including the use of mobile apps for scheduling truck operations at its terminal. Hactl has also pursued a container storage system that utilizes vertical space, Wilson Kwong, chief executive at Hactl, said during the webinar. “There we’ve got 3,500 positions to store the palletized cargo and that’s how we maximize the usage of the land available,” Kwong said. While no one strategy ensures success for every airport, panelists agreed that a holistic view of airport operations that values air cargo is necessary to address the current challenges. “When the airport recognizes the value of airfreight, they bring that together as part of the whole community,” NCA’s McWhorter said in closing. “We as airlines want to come in there and help them find ways to move in. Some airports do that really well. All the ones simply looking at it as a cash source for bringing flights in and out seem to miss the bigger picture.”

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