Big TSA Changes
Congress House Bill HR4176, Air Cargo Security Improvement Act, just passed last week. This act would require the TSA to establish an Air Cargo Division to carry out activities relating to ensuring that cargo transported on passenger aircraft does not pose a threat to aviation security.
TSA will also soon authorize third party canine companies to assist with current TSA-only canine inspections.
Horse Transport
The April 1 horse gate airfield access date has been deferred and will commence April 16.
Tariffs questioned
Brandon Fried, Executive Director, The Air Forwarders Association, has this to say about the recent Trump tariff tiff, “At this point, it is difficult to speculate on the impact of the tariffs since we will not know the full scope of impacted goods for about two weeks.
However, tariffs are essentially taxes that will end up being paid by U.S. consumers and anything that raises costs to consumers is bad, especially something that takes away the gains from tax reform.
The biggest misconception is that the tariffs will hurt China but really they will be paid by the U.S. consumer. Increased costs will likely damper demand for goods and the cargo transportation needed to move them”
New brand
SkyTeam Cargo is rebranding its four core products whose services will remain the same but name changed to better reflect the offering; Cohesion now called Customized; Equation changes to Express; Variation becomes Specialized; Dimension is now General. Air France KLM Cargo, Delta Cargo and Alitalia Cargo in the U.S. will implement the new branding in the second half of 2018.
Gold falls from sky
Gold bars said to be worth more than $378 million spilled from a Russian cargo plane door of an Antonov aircraft during take off from Yakutia, Siberia.
The precious shipments, which also included platinum and diamonds lay scattered along the Siberian runway. Reports say that more items fell out as the aircraft gained height some miles from the airport.
Authorities have since recovered 172 gold ingots weighing 3.4 tons but more is still missing as officials search the area.
Going electric
IATA’s World Cargo Symposium yielded encouragement for airlines to use electronic management DG handling and improve safety programs.
They are the IATA Dangerous Goods AutoCheck (DG AutoCheck) platform and its e-Dangerous Goods Declaration (e-DGD) standards. To file a shipper’s DGD that complies with IATA’s Dangerous Goods Regulations (DGR), customers may either enter declarations via web interface (pictured at right) or scan versions of paper DGD forms to convert the information into a digital record of the shipment.
Viva la France
WFS has gained new business in France. Qatar Airways Cargo and EVA Air have extended their cargo handling contract with Worldwide Flight Services (WFS) at Paris Charles de Gaulle Airport.
In addition to cargo handling services, WFS will now provide ramp transportation for the airlines, moving cargo to and from the warehouse and the aircraft operating Qatar Airways’ three flights a day from Paris to Doha.
DHL Parcel Metro
DHL has launched DHL Parcel Metro in the U.S. DHL says is a fast and flexible service for online retailers to satisfy consumers’ increasing demands for same-day and next-day delivery. This is no doubt a serious reaction to the expanding delivery network Amazon has in place. UPS and the U.S. Postal Service now have to step up to compete for this ever growing rapid delivery service.
‘PetSafe’ suspended
United Cargo has suspended its PetSafe program while it carries out reviews following a number of mishaps. One mishap allegedly killed a dog in the overhead passenger bin, while another misshipped another dog halfway around the world.
United voluntarily suspended the program until an investigation into better safeguards is established.
Lufthansa heist
$5 million dollars in cash was stolen by five men from Lufthansa on March 4. The money was to be flown to Frankfur on board a Lufthansa Cargo freighter. Robert DiNiro was allegedly spotted in the vicinity.
