News / DHL upbeat on Middle East airfreight: capacity returns as airspace reopens

“Gulf Air is operating out of Bahrain again and we have seen flights out of Baghdad and Beirut. Qatar Airways is now connecting into Beirut so, across the region cargo capacity is returning.”

Only Kuwait airspace now remained closed, he added.

He said now might be a good time for shippers, especially those waiting on “dislocated” ocean freight and containerised cargo or had time-sensitive goods on hold, to consider bringing in shipments by air – keeping in mind that in a new ‘escalation scenario’, capacity would likely be reduced very rapidly again.

However, an indication of how things remain far from normal in the Gulf can be gauged by DHL’s decision to postpone the launch of a cargo flight – Leipzig-Dubai-Hong Kong, five times weekly planned to start last week – on the advice of the EU Aviation Safety Agency (EASA).

“Given the uncertainty over the ceasefire and the recent attacks and seizure of ships, EASA deemed that the security risk to be too high to operate a flight into Dubai and on to Hong Kong. But the situation is being assessed every day and it could stabilise over the next few days,“ said Paul Dowling, DHL Express customer operations manager, MENA.

DHL continues to operate into Muscat and Riyadh, and these cities will remain its ‘alternative’ hubs for the foreseeable future. DHL is also serving Jeddah three times a week from Brussels.

And into Israel, DHL is flying daily into Tel Aviv, carrying volumes originating in Europe, the Americas and Asia.

Mr Dowling went on to reveal that DHL had introduced “a very short flight” between Muscat and Dubai, which was “taking the pressure off the road feeder service” the company had set up between the two cities.

Trucks were carrying Asia-origin freight unloaded from DHL’s Hong Kong-Muscat flight, but they were encountering congestion at the border between Oman and the UAE.

“We’re able to do this because the aircraft operating the flight is based in the Middle East, and the advisory out of Europe does not apply to it. So this (flight) is speeding up the transfer of traffic into Dubai and allowing us to connect into the ever-expanding commercial air network operating out of the UAE.”

This includes the return of daily UK-Qatar services, as well as connections to Bahrain, Iraq, and Lebanon. However, Kuwait’s airport remains closed due to infrastructure damage.

DGF VP and head of air freight, MENA, Ben Lambert, echoed the webinar’s upbeat tone.

“We’re seeing some real good traction, with more and more capacity coming into the Gulf region, and even flights into Dubai are continuing to increase. Just this week, we got information that Ethiopian Airlines was resuming its freighter back into DWC.

“We are hopeful that if the ceasefire continues, more and more freighter capacity will come in.”

However, DHL confirmed it had no plans to restart operations from its air hub in Bahrain.

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