17/05/2020
- There has been strong demand for air freight services since April, when Chinese factories got back to work
- Cargo flights have become critical in moving protective health equipment across the globe
Planes of German air carrier Lufthansa at the country’s largest airport in Frankfurt. Photo: Reuters
German freight carrier Lufthansa Cargo is expanding in China, surpassing 100 weekly flights for the first time, and adding new flights to Shenzhen.
Peter Gerber, CEO of Europe’s largest cargo airline, said there had been heavy demand for its services, though this might cool by the peak of summer.
“At the moment, cargo demand is very, very strong,” he told the Post. “It started to get strong in April, when Chinese industries got back to work, and after that we have seen a constant, heavy demand, a real peak.”
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Global air freight capacity has been squeezed as two-thirds of the world’s aircraft have been grounded by the
Covid-19 pandemic.
The collapse of air travel has practically put a stop to passenger flights, which typically carry half of all air cargo.
Since the pandemic, cargo flights have been critical in moving protective health equipment across the globe. From sending masks and other supplies to China in February, the German carrier is now taking urgent supplies from the mainland back to Europe.
Peter Gerber says Lufthansa Cargo has a high responsibility in maintaining supply chains, for both global health and world trade. Photo: Handout
“We have a high responsibility in maintaining supply chains in these unprecedented times for both global health and world trade,” Gerber said.
With the addition of Shenzhen, Lufthansa Cargo will fly to five destinations in China. It serves more than 300 destinations in 100 countries.
The cargo carrier is part of the Lufthansa Group and coordinates all the freight that goes into the passenger planes of its sibling brands, including Lufthansa, Swiss and Austrian.
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By next week, Lufthansa Cargo will be running more freight flights to China than the 72 passenger flights the group flew weekly before the pandemic to Beijing, Shanghai, Shenyang, Nanjing and Qingdao.
Lufthansa Cargo has a fleet of seven Boeing 777 Freighters (777Fs), with two new 777Fs arriving this year as part of its strategy to operate a fleet with a single aircraft type.
It also has six McDonnell Douglas-11Fs that Gerber said would still be retired as planned at the end of 2020, despite the extra demand for cargo capacity.
Its additional flights to China will make use of “preighters” – passenger aircraft flying cargo only. Gerber felt the trend of using empty passenger planes as “preighters” had peaked, pointing out that they cost the same to operate as freighters but carry only a fraction of the cargo.
Although he did not rule out future expansion, he said: “Demand will gradually come down in the next two or three months because a lot of equipment would have been shipped by then and some shipments will go on rail or ocean shipping.”
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He said some uncertainty remained over continued demand for airfreighted cargo, given the battered state of the world economy. Airlines would have to consider longer-term demand before deciding to invest more in cargo aircraft. “It depends how it looks beyond the next year,” he said.
Gerber said no decision had been taken yet on whether to convert some of the group’s orders for Boeing’s newest widebody 777X passenger aircraft into cargo planes.
He added that future plane orders would be balanced against the wider needs and spending decisions at Lufthansa Group, which is currently negotiating a government pandemic bailout package in the region of €9 billion (US$9.7 billion).
Source:SCMP
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18/09/2019
- Authorities investigating why passenger suddenly leapt to her feet and went through open door
The woman in yellow died after alighting from the moving bus in Fenggang county, Guizhou province, on Sunday. Photo: Weibo
Police in southern China are investigating the death of a woman who suddenly leapt from her seat and through the door of a moving bus on the weekend.
The unidentified woman was confirmed dead at hospital in Fenggang county, Guizhou province, on Sunday after alighting from the bus through the rear door which should have been closed, according to county police.
An officer from the county’s traffic police bureau told the South China Morning Post that an investigation into the woman’s action and the bus driver’s responsibility was under way.
Surveillance footage posted online shows the woman in a yellow top sitting near the open back door before suddenly getting up and rushing through the door.
The door then closes and the bus stops moments later as passengers appear shocked.
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The footage was shared widely online on Weibo, China’s Twitter-like platform.
Some internet users said the woman might have been dozing and awoke suddenly thinking she had missed her stop.
Others noted that the door should not have been open.
Just late last month, a woman was injured getting off a moving bus in Chongqing as the driver accidentally opened the rear door, video news app Kankanews.com reported.
The woman, in her 60s, simply stepped off as she saw the door open and thought she had arrived at her destination.
The driver said his safety belt loosened and he accidentally triggered the door button while trying to buckle up. He was held fully responsible for the passenger’s injury.
Source: SCMP
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