Quick-thinking Cargoitalia defied the volcano
Swift action on the part of Italy’s all cargo airline, Cargoitalia, enabled it to continue operating throughout the European airspace shutdown caused by the Icelandic volcano’s ash-cloud. As a result, the airline expects all backlogs to be cleared by late today (Thursday 22nd), and to be fully back to its normal schedule on Monday 26th April. When Cargoitalia’s Milan (Malpensa) home base closed to traffic on Saturday at 08:00, the airline had one aircraft in Hong Kong, and the other at Malpensa – loaded and ready for take-off to Chicago. The airline learned that that there was a possible opening on Monday morning, and immediately re-positioned the Hong Kong aircraft into Dubai, ready to bring it back into Malpensa at short notice. A brief opening of Malpensa at 07:00 on Monday enabled Cargoitalia to land the aircraft from Dubai, and despatch the waiting flight for Chicago. When Malpensa was closed again at 09:00 until further notice, Cargoitalia again had one aircraft stranded at Malpensa. On Monday at 21:00, it learned that Malpensa would open only partially on Tuesday morning, with passenger flights taking priority over cargo movements; the airline therefore decided to organise a fall-back hub operation using Brindisi in southern Italy, which had remained outside the no-fly zone. Within two hours everything had been arranged, and nine trucks departed Malpensa at 23:00 Monday night to meet the return flight from Chicago, which had been diverted into Brindisi. The outbound cargo was loaded, and the aircraft departed for New York at 21:00 Tuesday. The inbound cargo from Chicago was loaded onto the trucks, which transferred it back to Malpensa, arriving Wednesday evening. Meanwhile, taking advantage of another brief window for domestic flights from Malpensa on Tuesday morning, Cargoitalia re-positioned its second MD11 freighter to Brindisi, from where it successfully operated a Dubai/Hong Kong service with traffic from the previous weekend. Although the airline was ready to operate the return flight into Brindisi, the full re-opening of Malpensa on Tuesday at 12:00 rendered this unnecessary. Cargoitalia flights up until Monday will be subject to some re-scheduling, as the airline absorbs the impact of delayed flights over the previous period. Says Commercial Director Roberto Gilardoni: “We have postponed our service to New York and Chicago from Wednesday to late on Thursday. Our Saturday departure from Milan to Chicago will be cancelled, but our Sunday departure will operate from Milan to JFK, and will also call at Chicago before returning to Milan. We will serve Dubai and Hong Kong on Friday 23rd and Saturday 24th.” He continues: “Our fast actions in switching operations to Brindisi, and in seizing each small operational window to re-position our aircraft, enabled us to continue flying and minimise disruption to our clients. I am not aware of any other carrier that put in place such a thorough contigency plan, and all the effort certainly paid off.” “This has been a costly and challenging situation, but the total focus for us at all times was to maintain the fullest possible schedule and continue moving our clients’ shipments during this difficult period. I believe we have fully demonstrated our dedication to customer service, and our ability to respond quickly and effectively to an emergency.” Concludes Gilardoni: “We would like to thank our customers for their understanding and cooperation, and to pay tribute to our crews and staff for their exceptional efforts to maintain our services in the face of this unprecedented crisis.” Cargoitalia will take delivery of its next aircraft (a third MD-11SF) in June 2010, with further fleet expansion already planned up to 2014. Quelle: Cargoitalia S.p.A |