Digital bookings on the rise, but are sales stuck in analog?

• Charles Kauffman
• February 19, 2020
• Capacity & Demand, Cargo Facts EMEA, Carriers, Editorial, News

Digitalization of the cargo sales and booking process was a popular discussion topic at this year’s Cargo Facts EMEA, held earlier this month in Frankfurt. While interfacing with online booking platforms like cargo.one and Freightos’ WebCargo is a practice gaining traction among carriers, human sales agents are still central to the process. “We have a […]

CF EMEA 2020: Carriers look to innovate

• Jeff Lee
• February 4, 2020
• Cargo Facts EMEA, Carriers, Events, News

FRANKFURT – Carriers in the EMEA region continue to invest in innovating air cargo through new technologies, as evidenced when attendees gathered this week at the Westin Grand in Frankfurt, Germany, for the second edition of the Cargo Facts EMEA event. Turhan Ozen, chief cargo officer for Turkish Airlines, said the carrier is close to trialing […]

Lufthansa Cargo MD-11Fs find new homes

• Jeff Lee
• January 29, 2020
• Aircraft, Carriers, Equipment, News, Production Freighters, Strategy

[Update Jan. 30: UPS confirmed to Cargo Facts that it has purchased the two MD-11Fs and will be bringing them into service following modification work to make them common with the rest of the fleet.] A pair of Lufthansa Cargo’s recently retired MD-11Fs appears to have found new life with a different operator. Unit 48805, […]

No sign of December traffic rebound for combination carriers

• Charles Kauffman
• January 22, 2020
• Capacity & Demand, Carriers

After a month-to-month uptick in air cargo demand between October and November 2019, there was hope that peak season demand would push annual comparisons into positive territory in December 2019. While anecdotal reports suggest some regions and commodity segments saw an increase in December cargo traffic year over year, combination carriers showed little sign of improvement […]

Fleet modernization boosts December 2019 widebody freighter aircraft transactions

• Charles Kauffman
• January 16, 2020
• Freighter Aircraft Transactions

Of the twenty-seven freighter aircraft transactions (FATs) recorded by Cargo Facts in December 2019, nearly two-thirds involved widebody aircraft. Fleet modernization efforts undertaken by carriers such as Lufthansa Cargo and FedEx prompted many of the transactions involving twin-aisle freighters. To continue reading this feature, please go to Page 14 of our January 2020 issue.

Production freighter orders in 2019 – 747 nowhere to be seen

• Charles Kauffman and Jeff Lee
• January 15, 2020
• Aircraft, Carriers, Equipment, Features, Freighter Fleet Analysis, Production Freighters

Given that 2018 was such a stellar year for freighter orders, with eighty-three aircraft ordered, 2019 was perhaps always going to pale in comparison. Still, the year ended with a respectable twenty-eight production jet freighter aircraft being added to the order books. The orders for these twenty-eight aircraft, consisting of seventeen 777Fs and eleven 767-300Fs, […]

Top widebody freighter developments of 2019

• Jeff Lee
• January 3, 2020
• Aircraft, Carriers, Conversions, Equipment, Production Freighters, Widebody Conversions

As the first week of 2020 draws to a close, we look back and reflect on some of the most important and newsworthy developments affecting freighter aircraft types in 2019, starting with widebodies. To begin with, we note that while stories involving the 747 are consistently among our most popular, in 2019 this seemed to […]

European freighter fleet analysis (Part II): 777F on the rise

• Charles Kauffman and Jeff Lee
• December 30, 2019
• Aircraft, Carriers, Conversions, Features, Production Freighters, Strategy, Widebody Conversions, Widebody Fleet Analysis

This is the second part of our analysis of the European jet freighter fleet. Last week, we looked at narrowbodies in Part I. Turning to the widebody jet freighter fleet operated by European carriers, the chart shows that the total number increased 8.3% since last year to 209 units. Notably, the overall number of 747-400Fs […]