Finnair Cargo on the up in May

Finland’s flag-carrier, Finnair, has reported some positive results in relation to cargo carried last month.

The airline flew 97.3m revenue scheduled cargo tonne kilometres (CTKs) in May, up 16.8% compared to the same month of 2018.

In terms of volume, Finnair carried 15,350.6 tonnes of cargo in May, 12.8% more than in the same month of 2018.

Performance was particularly healthy on routes to the USA and Norway because of “positive market development”, the carrier confirmed.

Meanwhile, capacity as measured in available scheduled cargo tonne kilometres (ATKs) rose by 20.5% year on year to reach 177m.

The scheduled traffic cargo load factor therefore fell by 1.8% year on year to 54.9%.

The overall cargo load factor – including Finnair Cargo charters – fell by 2.1% year on year to the same figure of 54.9%.

Over the first five months of this year, Finnair carried a total of 67,167 tonnes of cargo. This represented a year on year increase of 18%.

The cargo load factor rose by 0.1 percentage points to reach 57.3% year on year for the January to May period.

Year on year comparisons in cargo figures were helped by fleet additions and service changes made by the Helsinki-headquartered carrier.

Finnair’s long-haul capacity increased with the addition of three new A350 aircraft that entered service in December 2018, in February this year and in April.

Capacity on the North American trade were increased the opening of a new Los Angeles route in March and extra frequencies to San Francisco compared to last year.

Additional frequencies are now also flown to some Asian destinations, notably Hong Kong, Osaka, Nanjing and Tokyo.

In Europe, extra frequencies to St Petersburg, London, Barcelona and Moscow and the addition of new destinations such as Lisbon and Hannover will have potentially helped the year on year comparisons.

Earlier this month (on June 4), Finnair confirmed that the managing director of Finnair Cargo, Janne Tarvainen, will leave the airline at the end of July to become managing director of Nordic Regional Airlines (Norra).

He will be succeeded by Mikko Tainio, currently the managing director of Finnair Kitchen but who has also worked in key positions in finance and ground operations.