Forwarding Agent Senator International will launch freighter services starting next weekend, linking Munich and Greenville-Spartanburg, South Carolina. Capacity provider will be Air Atlanta Icelandic. The main shipper is carmaker BMW.
The initial all-cargo flight is scheduled to take place on November 5th, celebrated by some hand-picked invitees who will gather at Munich Airport to witness the operation. Beginning then, the
Boeing 747-400 freighter aircraft of charter and ACMI carrier Air Atlanta Icelandic will serve the route across the North Atlantic twice a week, with take-offs at MUC taking place on Saturdays
and Wednesdays.
Prior to the pact with Air Atlanta Icelandic, Senator was in talks with different capacity providers, among them AirBridgeCargo and Cargolux. However, at the end the Icelandic company won the
race.
BMW air shuttles
Driver of the upcoming air chain is Munich-based BMW that is highly interested in constant flows of components, linking its German facilities including its many European suppliers of car parts
with its production plant in Spartanburg, where they assemble their different X-models.
Senator is responsible for marketing the entire capacity of the B-400F both westbound and eastbound. Although BMW will provide most tonnage, insiders speak of 70 to 80 percent, there will be a
gap of 20 to 40 tons depending on day and flight that will have to be filled to turn the project into a success story. In view of the current tough tariff situation on routes across the North
Atlantic, mainly from the USA to Europe, it won’t be an easy task to turn the flights into a cash machine.
Some candidates want to jump on the bandwagon
At this point of time it remains unclear if Senator will market the rest capacity themselves or rather collaborate with other forwarding agents in Europe and the U.S. to optimize the loads. The
latter seems to be more plausible, although Senator didn’t comment on this.
However, some weeks ago, Senator CEO Tim Oliver Kirschbaum told CargoForwarder Global that some agents had knocked at his company’s doors already, showing their interest by offering co-loading
options.
With or without external support, at Senator they are convinced that the risk is manageable; otherwise they wouldn’t have participated in a tender in which the terms and conditions were clearly
set out, to secure this large piece of BMW’s global transportation cake.
Meanwhile, Cargo Chief of Munich Airport, Markus Heinelt has warmly welcomed the new freighter flights on behalf of agent Senator. “The services up our attractiveness as a location for all-cargo
flights,” stated Markus.
Heiner Siegmund
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