Asian goals for Helsinki
11 / 11 / 2010
HELSINKI is looking to get a larger share of cargo flows between Asia and a number of markets within its reach, from Finland’s Scandinavian neighbours to Russia and the Baltic States.
These ambitions received a large shot in the arm in the spring, when Finnair launched freighter flights to Hong Kong and Seoul. With the last two MD-11s in the airline’s passenger fleet due to exit service earlier this year, the cargo division took hold of the first of the two and had it turned into freighter configuration. In May it entered service with twice weekly flights each to Korea and Hong Kong. In the summer Finnair added a third weekly rotation on the Hong Kong sector.
According to Antero Lahtinen (right), senior vice-president of Finnair and managing director of Finnair Cargo and Finnair Cargo Terminal Operations, the freighter accounts for 10-20 per cent of the carrier’s cargo turnover.
In the first nine months of the year Finnair carried over 70,000 tonnes of cargo. “We are pleased to report a very healthy growth during the first nine months of the year. On average our growth has been between 30 and 40 per cent over the last year,” Lahtinen remarked.
For the full story read the latest free digital edition of Air Cargo News, no. 690 dated 1 November, here.
