Listen: Humanitarian aid takes flight, plus more IAI conversions

This shorter week was full of activity, ranging from narrowbody and widebody conversions to drone developments. In this episode of “Cargo Facts Connect,” Cargo Facts Editor Jeff Lee and Associate Editors Andrew Crider and Robert Luke discuss aid delivery using drones, Emirates converting its own 777 feedstock into freighters and IAI’s first 737-800BDSF conversion at Atitech in Italy. Crider also checks in from West Virginia after conducting a humanitarian relief flight in his own aircraft. A transcript is available below. This transcript has been generated by software and is being presented as is. Some transcription errors may remain. Andrew Crider Hello and welcome to this episode of cargo facts connect the podcast of cargo facts the newsletter of record for the air cargo and freighter aircraft industries for over 40 years. I'm your host Andrew Crider, associate editor of cargo facts. Robert Luke And I'm Robert Luke, associate editor of cargo Facts Jeff Lee and I'm Jeff Lee, editor of cargo Facts. Andrew Crider I'm currently at Mercer County Airport, Bluefield, West Virginia, where we have aircraft of general aviation participating in a charity airlift operation to benefit the kind people of Bluefield, West Virginia. My aircraft itself, Van's aircraft, rv 12. November nine to eight Alpha Charlie carried 100 pounds of perishable items, baby food, diapers and toys for the kids. We have a total of nine aircraft participate today, including two Cirrus is a pilatus PC 12 million, and we go. But that's not the only humanitarian airlift operation that began this week, is it Jeff? Jeff Lee Right and let me just say, I'm proud of you. And thank you for turning your aircraft into a makeshift freighter aircraft, in a sense, and for this very noble cause. But you're right. This week, we saw drone delivery Canada, announcing that it has secured the special flight operations certificate for beyond visual line of sight operations. And so what they're going to do is that in a partnership with the University of British Columbia, they're going to use their Sparrow drone to start delivering medical supplies and other equipment in remote communities in Northwest Canada. And they also started commercial route deliveries and commercial operations at Edmonton International Airport. Also with the sparrow drone, and this baritone, you know, might be small, but has a payload of about four kilograms. But, you know, this is we're seeing more and more of these drone stories now. And we know that they are ideal for remote locations, and rural areas, there are many of these kinds of areas in Canada. And so we're gonna, we're gonna continue seeing more of these. And in fact, even in recent months, we've seen a couple of other manufacturers announcing operations on unveiling the drones. So, you know, this is a recurring thing that we will continue to see more of going, even going up to, you know, very large drones, like we saw at cargo facts emea with Natilus and blended wing design. But yeah, I think it's, it's very interesting, and we will continue to report more and more on these. Andrew Crider And that's not the only drone news we had this week. We know Elroy has been on structural testing of their aircraft at Chaparral, which hopes to be a huge watershed moment for the new drone technology. But even more permanently, Walmart as paired up with an aggressive plan with drone up to start servicing about six different states in the United States. With on demand drone delivery service. We have a lot more information to be coming on this story as it is developing. We've made contact with drone up and they told us to expect some more news later in July. But that isn't the only big news that we had this week. Isn't that right, Robert? Robert Luke Absolutely, Andrew. And first, let me just thank you for all of your efforts to provide humanitarian support, you know, that's definitely heartfelt and appreciated not only for myself and the rest of the team, but from everybody else that's receiving that aid and assistance and definitive need for the supplies. But moving on to the news that at hand. Dubai based Emirates will convert six more triple sevens into freighters. Emirates were used as own aircraft as feedstock for the convergence which will serve to provide capacity growth and it will have 10 triple seven conversions by the end of 2026. In the airline has still ate reconfigured triple seven 300 er passenger freighters in operation right now. And three are already earmarked for conversion and will not return to passenger configuration. Emirates also be noted has the largest fleet of triple seven ers roughly around 120. And that is just good news for the widebody market as it continues to trend in the upward direction regarding conversions on the narrowbody side of the Freighter market, IAI completed with atitech its first freighter conversion in Europe a 737 800 BDS F. The X Scandinavian aircraft acquired by DHL arrived at the facility in December 2021. And in addition to that, a second one was just recently undergoing conversion in February. Also I in addition to the Naples conversion site, it has its own center in Tel Aviv, as well as other facilities for 737 next gen configurations to include Ling Xian Belenko and Yang Chang, Cynthia airport. Hey, Tianjin, Tianjin, Ben Hi. And also Mexican MRO services at Mexico, Benito Juarez International Airport, and they do have plans to establish the new conversion site and Lithuania and the near future. And speaking of new conversions, Jeff, I'll pass it on back to you. So you can discuss what Boeing has and plans to further support 737 narrowbody conversion market Jeff Lee Yeah so we we, again, continuing to see you know, more of these, the expansion in conversion capacity all around the world. And we're seeing people establish sites away from China. So Boeing, only recently actually just started its own conversion line at the London Gatwick facility. And they're working on but their first 737 800 BCF. But thinking back to cargo facts symposium last year, both Boeing and AEI mentioned that they were looking at further expansion, particularly in Europe, and maybe specifically Eastern Europe. And so we'll see, you know, where, which facilities they picked, but in terms of Boeing, apart from Gatwick, they've already started another conversion line down in Costa Rica at the coupe set facility. And we know as well that next year, there'll be using the KF aerospace facility up in Kelowna, Canada, which coincidentally, AEI is also using. So you know, there's, it's interesting to see facilities that are working on multiple STC programs. But yeah, we'll see what happens with all these conversion facilities. Robert Luke These are definitely some interesting times for sure. Andrew Crider I am really excited to always see the growth and conversion potential and see what these aircraft will do. I mean, right here in Bluefield, West Virginia, we can see what aircraft were able to do for the community here when they were converting, just for the day and their freighter specifications. And thank you, Robert, for that. It's what we'd like to do in the cargo industry. I'm certainly not not alone, among our fantastic listeners. And to that, that's all the time that we have for today. I want to thank you for listening in and encourage you to tune in next time. For more multimedia content like this. Check out cargo facts.com or search cargo facts connect on iTunes, or Spotify. Join us again next time. Subscribe to Cargo Facts Connect on iTunes or Spotify , or download the episode on Transistor . Join Air Cargo World and Cargo Facts as we put technology in focus at the 2022 Air Cargo Tech Summit. Taking place June 6-7 in Miami, this new event will provide participants with the foundation for technological improvement in airfreight logistics. Learn more and register.

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