PAX TO PACKS

摘要

Overwhelming demand for medicine and personal protection equipment (PPE) has seen a huge upturn in cargo operations worldwide. For example, the North Atlantic is one of the busiest air routes in the world, but a glance at a website like Flightradar24.com reveals it is not uncommon to see more freighter aircraft crossing the Atlantic than passenger aircraft these days. Night is a traditional time for cargo operations, but now the sky is full of cargo operators flying unusual routings and unusual aircraft types to match charter or market demands. At the same time, e-commerce is booming in various countries, as people shop online during lockdown, further increasing demand. Another factor, perhaps less obvious, is that about half of all air freight is carried in the belly holds of passenger aircraft on scheduled services. With a majority of the world's fleet currently sitting idle on the ground, the loss of this has resulted in a quite significant reduction in overall capacity. In normal times, this space was widely used and sometimes demand led to larger aircraft being allocated to relatively short haul routes - both British Airways and Iberia had one daily flight between London and Madrid, a two-hour flight, with a widebody aircraft. While passengers enjoyed a surprising long-haul experience, the money was being made beneath their seat.