Korean Air Achieves 10,000 Flights with Cargo-Only Passenger Aircraft

A Korean Air employee is loading about 800kg of COVID-19 vaccine raw materials onto flight KE925 bound for Amsterdam in December last year.

[Asia Economy Reporter Dongwoo Lee] Korean Air announced on the 2nd that it has achieved 10,000 flights of cargo-only passenger aircraft as of the 1st. It has been about 1 year and 5 months since it started operating cargo-only passenger flights on the Incheon~Ho Chi Minh route in March last year.

Korean Air has operated cargo-only passenger aircraft on 65 routes worldwide including North America, Europe, Southeast Asia, China, and Japan, transporting a total of 400,000 tons of cargo globally. This amounts to transporting 40 tons per round trip and 20 tons per one-way trip.

After the outbreak of COVID-19, when most passenger flights were suspended, the company proactively utilized passenger aircraft as cargo planes. While there were 38 cargo-only passenger flights per month as of March last year, the number now exceeds 800 flights per month.

Korean Air has increased cargo loading capacity through continuous research and efforts in collaboration with the Ministry of Land, Infrastructure and Transport and aircraft manufacturers by utilizing overhead bins above passenger seats, ‘cargo seatbacks’ which are safety devices that allow cargo to be loaded in passenger seat spaces, and CFL (Cargo Floor Loading) which involves removing seats to load cargo.

Korean Air is actively responding to urgent demands related to quarantine by scheduling flights accordingly. Quarantine supplies such as diagnostic kits, protective suits, and masks are major cargo items for cargo-only passenger aircraft. Korean Air deployed cargo-only passenger flights over 100 times to India, where COVID-19 cases surged, to transport quarantine supplies, and operated charter flights carrying diagnostic kits to Baltimore Airport in the United States. Currently, Korean Air is transporting quarantine supplies worldwide including Indonesia, Singapore, Germany, and Canada.

Korean Air also set a new record for the longest flight distance. On June 12, flight KE8047 carrying COVID-19 diagnostic kits flew non-stop for 14 hours and 42 minutes over 13,405 km on the Incheon~Miami route, breaking the previous longest distance record.

Korean Air is maximizing the operation of available passenger aircraft to increase supply for urgent export-import logistics support. The cargo transported by Korean Air on passenger aircraft dropped sharply to about 16,000 tons per month immediately after the COVID-19 outbreak but has increased again to over 40,000 tons per month since 2021, which is almost the same level as when passenger flights were operating normally.

Meanwhile, Korean Air is also making active efforts to support logistics for small and medium-sized shippers. In cooperation with the Ministry of Trade, Industry and Energy and the Korea International Trade Association, Korean Air organized dedicated charter flights for small and medium export companies to Indonesia and Japan last year, and this year it has set a separate dedicated supply volume on regular cargo flights to Los Angeles, USA, to support export logistics for domestic companies.

A Korean Air official said, “In the second half of the year, when export-import cargo volumes traditionally increase, the role of cargo-only passenger aircraft is expected to become more important. As a national airline, we will strive to create a stable logistics export-import environment through active supply securing.”