Night flight ban causes stir

MM&D MAGAZINE, NOVEMBER/DECEMBER 2011 PRINT EDITION:

A ban on cargo flights at night could have serious consequences for the international logistics industry, says Lufthansa Cargo chairman Karl Ulrich Garnadt.

The October 30 ruling from a German court banning night flights from Frankfurt was issued days before the introduction of winter flight schedules. Lufthansa Cargo has put together an emergency timetable, said Garnadt.

“We’ve managed at great expense to keep our customer services comparatively intact,” he said. “The night-flight ban has forced us to lay on a timetable, which in part is economically and ecologically absurd. We will be operating in future with unnecessary take-offs and landings, which will lead to more noise, higher fuel consumption and more costs, running into millions.”

A number of Lufthansa’s flights have been relocated to daytime slots or early and late hours of the day, while individual connections—for example to China—have been cancelled. Other flights bound for China would have to stop at Cologne/Bonn Airport after an evening departure from Frankfurt. This would then allow the flights to continue towards Asia at night, as originally planned.

Beginning in January, an MD-11 freighter will be transferred from Frankfurt to Cologne/Bonn Airport. The freighter will operate overnight flights to North America. Roughly 40 percent of German exports are transported by air, Garnadt said, and a blanket ban on the nighttime flights could sever Germany from global trade lanes.

“Closing the world’s seventh biggest airport for six hours each night and thereby decoupling it from the international goods flows constitutes a severe blow to the air traffic industry,” he said. “No other transport mode is subject to such operational restrictions.”

The Miami, Florida-based International Air Cargo Association also weighed in on the ban, saying it would have wide-ranging consequences for the industry. “It means a negative impact not only on airlines, but shippers and all the businesses and consumers linked to the shipments,” said the organization’s chairman, Michael Steen. “It also results in flights being re-routed over longer distances or flown at different times, which can lead to greater congestion and emissions during daytime hours.”

Steen noted night flights were often the best or only way for cargo to fly. “All-cargo operations are often forced to fly nighttime operations because of slot restrictions that have been steadily increased over the years,” he said. “Particularly as passenger flights are usually given preference ahead of freighter services.”

The federal administrative court in Leipzig (Germany’s supreme court of appeal) is due to rule soon on whether to allow the night flights in the first quarter of 2012.