Air Partner to attend Air Cargo Forum 2016 to strengthen industry relationships

24 Oct 2016

Air Partner, the global aviation services group, will be attending TIACA's 28th International Air Cargo Forum & Exhibition from 26-28 October, which this year will be held in Paris, France. Air Partner will be exhibiting at stand 623 and members of the team will be on-hand to talk more about Air Partner’s extensive freight solutions.

Over 3000 supply chain decision-makers are expected to attend this year’s event, including a large number of freight forwarders with whom Air Partner enjoys longstanding relationships.

Recent case study

Air Partner recently carried out a time-critical lift of a CAT scanner on behalf of a German freight forwarder, which was working for a German healthcare company. The scanner, along with its accessories, needed to be urgently transported from Germany to a hospital in Lahore, Pakistan. A charter flight was required due to the limited lifespan of the battery powering its internal systems.

The Air Partner Freight team located suitable aircrafts that were able to depart from German airports, but a cheaper one-way option was found in the Czech Republic. The client opted for this latter choice, as Air Partner was able to also arrange the safe trucking of the medical equipment within the permitted timeframe.

The total weight of the shipment was 14.5 tonnes, with the heaviest piece being the scanner itself at five tonnes. The aircraft used, an Antonov 12, is not palletised but the dimensions of the scanner (3m x 218cm x 230cm) meant that the Freight team had to arrange a conventional wide body aircraft pallet to ease the loading process.

The pallet was brought directly to the factory on a flatbed truck, and the scanner was then loaded and secured at a height that made it easy to transfer directly onto the aircraft. The cargo was then trucked to Brno–Tuřany Airport in the Czech Republic before being swiftly loaded onto the AN-12 for its onward journey to Lahore – with just one technical stop in Tiblisi, Georgia.

Mike Hill, Director of Freight at Air Partner, commented: “The freight team did a great job in sourcing a creative solution that was both within budget and timescale for our valued client. This is a great example of our role as consultants to the freight forwarding industry, and how we fully understand the requirements of our clients and are able to provide innovative solutions. Our clients have the confidence to work with us year on year due to our industry expertise and our dedication to the freight forwarding community: they value our services in both charter and hand-carry solutions, be it pick up, last mile delivery or the whole operation, door to door.”