eight new B777Fs are delivered to
Aerologic’s Leipzig home base, LH
Cargo MD-11Fs, previously used to
support the joint venture, are being
returned, unwanted, to Frankfurt.
Dr. Andreas Otto, executive board
member product and sales LH Cargo,
now confirms that at least four of the
airline’s freighter fleet will remain
parked at Frankfurt through next
year. The remaining 15 aircraft will
work a reduce schedule, effectively
taking the equivalent of a further two
aircraft out of the equation.
Luxembourg’s Cargolux, in theory,
should have more to worry about
than most. Its only business is carrying cargo with an oceanic size fleet of
B747-400Fs. Of even greater concern
should be the fact that it is committed to acquiring a fleet of 13 new
B747-8Fs, offering a frightening 140
tonnes of capacity each.
Ulrich Ogiermann, president and
CEO of the carrier, seems remarkably sanguine about the prospect.
“It has always been the nature of
the cyclical aviation market that new
aircraft are ordered at the peak of a
cycle and delivered at the bottom of
it, although it has never been such a
spectacular drop as this.”
Cargolux has already begun selling
off its older fleet in anticipation of the
new arrivals and believes it will be
able to manage the transfer successfully in the current climate change.
“The original intention was to dry
lease capacity to make-up for any
shortfall during this period,“ says
Ogiermann. “But that is now not the
case and we, like other carriers, will
be looking to rein in capacity and reduce frequencies.”
The airline has at least gained
some respite from Boeing with the
announcement that the B747-8F
program has been put back again
and that launch customer Cargolux
will now not receive its first aircraft
until the back end of next year, more
than three years later than originally
slated.
It is obvious that European
freighter operators are going to
become more discriminating about
which markets they serve and how
they serve them. Cargolux for instance, has now got its Italian subsidiary, Cargolux Italia up and running.
It is a move designed to firmly embed
the airline in a particular market.
British Airways World Cargo, for
its part, seems to have survived the
maelstrom relatively intact. Its policy
of using its three B747-400Fs as a
supplement to its mainstream bel-lyhold cargo business, rather than
a mainstay, seems to have paid off.
Although, as Sean Doyle mentions,
the airline took a big hit in terms of
revenue flow, a policy of pursing high
yield premium business helped it pull
through.
But still newcomers keep arriving.
As if the big name carriers had not
spelled it out clearly enough, that the
name of the game has changed, there
are still those apparently determined
to believe that freighters are the
business to be in.
A rejuvenated Cargoitalia has
launched scheduled freighters services out of Italy, on the back of the
purchase earlier this year of the ailing Alitalia cargo business, thanks to
the financial input of its new owner
ALIS Aerolinee Italiane.
The Italian cargo carrier has initiated twice weekly services to New
York and Toronto, with a similar rotation to Hong Kong out of its Milan
base using MD-11SF equipment.
Commercial director Roberto
Gilardoni appears to be counting
heavily on the support of the Italian
forwarding community to ensure
the success of Cargoitalia this time
around.
“The market here in Italy is extremely supportive of our new venture, and we are very confident that
we will quickly build a loyal business
base for this and our future routes,”
he insists. “ It is clear that the Italian
air cargo community greatly appreciates the restoration of an Italian-owned and managed pure freighter
operation.”
Cargoitalia’s confidence appears
to be riding high, but it needs to be.
The new owner has no less than five
brand new A330 freighters set for
delivery from 2012, with options for
a further three of the type.
Meanwhile Air Cargo Germany has
finally struggled into the air out of its
Hahn airport base, with two B747-
400Fs acquired from China Airlines.
It has taken the fledging German
carrier the best part of the year to
get its air operator’s certificate issued and both aircraft in the air.
Even then, CEO Michael Bock describes the carrier as pursing a soft
start-up of charter operations.
When scheduled services are finally initiated the airline talks of serving
a vicarious network to include Moscow, Shanghai, Istanbul, Bombay and
Hong Kong.
Air Cargo Germany will have one
very major competitor on its doorstep, in the form of Lufthansa Cargo
at neighboring Frankfurt airport.
But Bock does not see this as a deterrent: “We are just a niche player,
so we of course are not a major threat
to Lufthansa Cargo, but many agents
in Germany tell us they would prefer
to have a choice between two different German capacity providers.”
ACG will also take a different
approach to the market aiming to
largely fill its aircraft with as many
block space agreements as possible.
The company should maybe take
note that as it took off, Belgium’s
Cargo B Airlines fell out of the sky,
being forced to suspend its South
American and African services, operated with just two B747-400s.
This was despite financial backing
from NYK, the Japanese shipping giant and parent company of Nippon
Cargo Airlines. It was claimed that
although Cargo B was able to stay
on target as far as the load factors
were concerned yields fell below the
level required to make the operation
viable.
Freighters used to be a good
business for European carriers. At
the very least, it is now a very risky
business. ACW
