Cargo Facts Consulting releases new data on freighter capacity

Cargo Facts Consulting today launched a data service that maps freighter capacity deployed worldwide. The CFC Freighter Capacity Data is part of the Insights product within the Cargo Facts website and answers three questions for air cargo professionals: Who is flying, to where and with which aircraft? This data is particularly crucial considering the recent air cargo network disruptions because of the war in Iran. The Capacity Data applies proprietary analytics to flight data to home in on freighter capacity details. Capacity by operator, region and fleet type can be compared seamlessly. The structure follows those fundamentals: Operator view: where capacity is deployed, and at what scale; Regional flow view : how capacity moves between markets, and how trade lanes evolve; and Fleet view : which aircraft types are driving capacity across different networks. What makes this relevant now is the environment the market is operating in. Recent disruption in the Middle East didn’t stop cargo flows, but it exposed how concentrated and interdependent the system had become . When the Gulf hub model was temporarily disrupted, capacity did not disappear; it was redistributed across the network, Cargo Facts Consulting data shows. According to the data, network shifts happened quickly: Middle East capacity fell by more than 50% at the peak of disruption, making it the weakest-performing region globally; Europe-Middle East and Middle East-Asia lanes dropped by close to 60%, a measure of how much the region functions as a transit spine; Asia-Europe freighter capacity rose by over 25% as operators bypassed traditional hubs; Secondary gateways absorbed the shock unevenly — Riyadh and Jeddah held 80% of freighter capacity, while Dubai fell to around 35% and Abu Dhabi to 30% of their capacity; and Outside the core disruption zone, Egypt capacity rose 14% and Oman throughput reached 160% to 170% of prior levels. The system kept working on different terms: less optimized, more adaptive, with urgency over cost and a single hub structure replaced by a wider set of corridors. [caption id="attachment_57296837" align="aligncenter" width="1641"] Figure 1 - Middle East capacity flows and operator deployment by aircraft type. (Cargo Facts Consulting)[/caption] The dashboard makes that visible (see Figure 1 above). Filter by Middle East as origin region for March and the picture sharpens immediately: Turkish Airlines led at 55,300 tonnes — more than Emirates and Etihad combined — followed by Cargolux and Qatar Airways in a tight band with Etihad between 15,000 and 19,000 tonnes. That ranking is a snapshot of how the regional pecking order has shifted as the Gulf hub model fragmented. The 777F type alone carried 51% of capacity out of the region, with the 747-400ERF at 16% and the A330-200P2F at 12%. The map view shows where that capacity went, with the heaviest concentration on Europe-bound corridors and a thinner but visible spread into Asia-Pacific. “The point isn’t a single number,” Cargo Facts Consulting Director Guillermo Ochovo said. “It’s that operator share, fleet mix and trade-lane flows can be read against each other in the same view, so a shift in one shows up as a shift in the others.” The data was built for airlines tracking network exposure, lessors assessing fleet positioning and logistics providers navigating volatile corridors that are already treating this kind of cross-cut view as a core requirement, Ochovo said. Cargo Facts Consulting will add to its capacity data. Soon, the data will include extended snapshots of performance for longer-running views on behavior over time and historical trend tracking, utilization insights across fleets and networks, and the integration of belly capacity to complete the supply picture. “We want to track not only where the market sits, but where it’s heading,” Ochovo said.

Cargo Facts Consulting releases new data on freighter capacity

Data offers details on who is flying, to where and with which freighter types

Air Central plans widebody additions to support long-haul growth

IAI rolls out A330-300BDSF prototype

Related Posts

June brings stability, not relief

May freighter capacity extends April’s higher operating level

Pressure eases, rates hold firm

IAI rolls out A330-300BDSF prototype

Cargo Facts Free Newsletters

Cargo Facts Connect Podcast

Follow Us

Welcome Back!

Retrieve your password