Top 20 cargo airports: Cincinnati/Northern Kentucky the big winner
19 / 07 / 2023
Source: Amazon
Cincinnati/Northern Kentucky International Airport reported the largest percentage increase in cargo volumes last year of the top 20 cargo airports, according to the latest statistics (see chart at end of article) from Airports Council International (ACI).
ACI released its provisional figures for the top 10 airports back in April, showing that Hong Kong International remained the busiest cargo airport in the world last year despite a fall in demand related to Covid restrictions on airline crew and airport workers that hampered operations.
The council has now released its final figures for 2022 and has also provided data for those airports placed 11-20.
Cincinnati/Northern Kentucky International Airport – home to Amazon Air’s primary US hub and DHL Express’ hub for the Americas – witnessed the largest cargo volume growth (+16.8%) amongst the top 20 airports.
During the year, DHL Express added capacity from Vietnam, Hong Kong and Japan to the airport, while Silk Way West began flying there from Baku.
Meanwhile, at that stage, Amazon Air was still ramping up its freighter capacity – it has since reduced its fleet.
The only other airport from the top 20 to report an increase in demand was UPS’s hub in Louisville, where volumes increased by 0.5%.
Overall air cargo volumes at airports fell by 6.7% year on year (-2.6% versus 2019) in 2022, to close to 117m metric tonnes.
“The decline can be attributed to the ongoing geopolitical tensions and disruptions to global trade and supply chains,” ACI said.
The council also pointed out that air cargo traffic is more concentrated amongst the main airports: volumes in the top 20 represent around 42% of the global volumes.
