Bangkok--21 Oct--Spark Communications
Emirates SkyCargo has launched direct services to the South African port city of Durban, its third destination in the country and 17th in Africa.
The inaugural flight, which departed Dubai International Airport at 10.25hrs and touched down in KwaZulu Natal province at 17.10hrs local time, was carrying 14 tonnes of cargo in the belly of an Airbus A330-200 passenger aircraft.
Emirates SkyCargo has been serving the Durban market via road feeder services from Johannesburg and Cape Town and by air through its codeshare partners for 14 years.
In the 12-month period between August 2008 and July 2009, Emirates SkyCargo’s uplift of South African exports increased nearly four-fold over the previous 12 months to more than 50 million kilograms. The growth can be attributed to the introduction of the Cape Town service in March 2008 and the addition of the third daily flight to Johannesburg.
Further growth is expected with nearly 100 tonnes of additional capacity each week out of Durban.
Peter Sedgley, Senior Vice President Cargo Commercial Operations, said Emirates was ideally placed provide the port city with swift, reliable connections to its trading partners around the world. “There is a variety of commodities moving out of Durban — car parts, pay channel decoders, electronic parking meters, aluminium, electronics, tools, perishables such as pineapples, and textiles — to markets as far afield as Europe, the Middle East, the US and Australia. Emirates, with our short connection times and modern facilities, has been serving the South Africa for 14 years and we are looking forward to better serving Durban with this new service.
“We have appointed a great team with more than half a century of combined experience in the Durban cargo industry who are geared up to take Emirates to the next level.”
Led by Kum Naicker, Cargo Manager South Africa, the Emirates SkyCargo team in Durban comprises Cargo Manager Nathan Padayachy, Cargo Supervisor Jitesh Baichan, Senior Cargo Assistant Patrick Cele and Cargo Assistant Rajiv Sarjoo.
EK419 leaves Suvarnabhumi Airport at 02.30 hrs and arrives in Dubai at 05.35 hrs. Then it connects with EK775 which departs Dubai at 10.25hrs and arriving at Durban International Airport at 17.10hrs.
On the return flight, EK 776 leaves Durban at 18.40hrs and gets into Dubai at 05.20hrs. From Dubai, EK418 leaves at 8.50 hrs and lands at Suvarnabhumi Airport at 18.10 hrs.
About Emirates SkyCargo
the freight division of Emirates Airline carried 1.4 million tonnes of cargo in the 2008-09 financial year, an improvement of 9.8 per cent over the previous year’s 1.3 million tonnes, helping revenue to increase by 14.8 per cent to $ 2.1 billion, up from $ 1.8 billion in 2007-08.
Cargo revenue contributed 19 per cent to the airline’s total transport revenue.
Emirates SkyCargo took delivery of its first Boeing 777 freighter at the end of the financial year, bringing the total freighter fleet to eight aircraft — including six 747Fs, and the two Boeing 777Fs operated by Emirates. In all, Emirates SkyCargo carries freight in 138 aircraft, including bellyhold space in the passenger fleet, to 61 countries on six continents.
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