When shipping goods by air freight, time often plays a critical role. The specialists of Karl Gross realize air freight solutions by charter flight.
For very urgent international and intercontinental shipments, air freight is the transport mode of choice. “When transport time needs to be reduced to a minimum to adhere to delivery dates, air freight is usually the fastest and the most reliable way of transportation” says Zhipeng Liu. He is the team leader of exports in our Frankfurt office.
Cargo volume determines the type of aircraft
Short transport times also turns out to be crucial for one of our clients – a worldwide leading provider of railway infrastructure – whose goods are generally shipped via ocean freight. Almost 200 packages with a total weight of more than 100 tons had to be shipped from Germany to Indonesia on short notice. Another requirement was to transport the entire shipment in one lot.
Our air freight specialists in Frankfurt/Main, Germany took on the case. They knew for this consignment shipping goods belly freight using a passenger aircraft would not be an option nor a regular air freight transport via freighter. So they had to charter a freighter – a Boeing 747-400. “The freight volume was quite high and our client wanted to have the entire shipment transported in one lot. In that case chartering a freighter was the most efficient and economical way of transportation” says Zhipeng. Right away our specialists checked the availability of suitable freighters and arranged for all flight permits and traffic rights, while applying for a suitable slot at the airport.
Collecting all part loads
The consignment consisted of several part loads. They had to be delivered to and consolidated at the airport. Two colleagues from our “Air Cargo Project” team were on site for monitoring the processes of delivery, loading operations and securing of cargo. They also coordinated final details with the parties directly at the airport.
The parts of the shipment came from different places in Europe. Within three days, all of the packages arrived at the airline’s warehouse at the airport. Before stowing and fixing the freight onto unit load devices, the cargo went through the mandatory security checks.
A detailed freight plan
“For stowing and securing the cargo on board of the freighter, a stowage plan was created providing a detailed overview of the loading position of every single package” explains Zhipeng. “Such an exact stowage plan is a must have. The weight onboard the aircraft needs to be well-balanced for flight safety reasons. This requires precise pre-planning.” Highloaders (hydraulic ramps) were used to lift the cargo from ground level to aircraft level and to load the cargo on board.
An exact freight plan is a must have as the weight need to be well-balanced on board.
The freighter departed in time from the airport at noon. “For refueling the freighter, it had to stopover at the in United Arab Emirates”, says our air freight specialist Zhipeng. “The stopover took around three and a half hours, a rest for the crew was not necessary.” The cargo arrived on time, the next day, in Indonesia.
