interview
bellyhold cargo capacity, and that’s about the same composition of aircraft as a fleet like Lufthansa.”
You have a lot of bellyhold and freighter cargo space. Which world areas do you serve with this capacity?
“We are currently flying to 26 points with our freighters plus 172 destinations being covered by Turkish Airlines passenger flights. This has given us the world’s eighth- largest airline network and each year we are adding about 10-15 more passenger destinations. “We are very strong in Europe with nine destinations in
Germany, five in Italy, four in France and in the UK. We are covering more destinations in the Far East with B777 aircraft. In North America we fly to New York, Chicago, Los Angeles and Washington. “We are increasing our US frequencies and we also have
plans to maybe expand to Atlanta and Miami. We are flying five times weekly to São Paulo with a B777 – offering a 20- tonne bellyhold cargo load – and there will be more destinations in the future ... probably one more during this year. Iraq is another growing market. We currently have freighter services into four cities in the country: Baghdad, Basra, Erbil and Mosul.”
Do you have plans to expand further into Africa?
“We are also stretching down into Africa, opening new destinations. In the past we only served destinations in northern Africa. Now we are flying into central and southern cities on the continent. Most of the services are operated by narrowbody aircraft with a limited cargo capacity. “So as the new freighters come in we will be using them
to some of these destinations. I think Nairobi and Addis Ababa will be the first freighter points, but it might take a bit of time as we have to work on designing these routes to ensure full loads in both directions.”
With such a big passenger fleet, how do you deal with directional imbalance?
“The imbalance between East and West cargo flows is very noticeable. Passengers generally fly on return tickets, but cargo is a one-way ticket and you don’t get the same chance. So you have to try and balance the directional loads. In Europe we grow with narrowbody aircraft, while to the Far East the expansion is in widebody capacity. “This creates a disparity that can be balanced by the use
of freighters. The main-deck capacity can be used to fly freight to and from the airline’s Istanbul hub to feed and defeed the bellyhold capacity of the widebody fleet.”
Passengers generally fly on return tickets, but cargo is a one-way ticket”
Your hub is at Istanbul’s Ataturk International airport, which is a very busy gateway. Do you have enough space there to fulfil your cargo ambitions?
“All the expansion both at Turkish Airlines and within the country’s economy has given rise to the need for a third airport in Istanbul to supplement the capacity offered by our main Ataturk gateway and the Sabiha Gökçen airport, which is on the Asian side of the Bosphorus. “The extra capacity is needed in Istanbul as cargo
expansion opportunities at Ataturk are limited for the future. Business is a succession of hurdles at the moment, but we are trying to find the way over them. We will be in the market even more aggressively in the future, as we gain even more cargo capacity to fill.”
Istanbul was once the centre of the known world and the crossroads of world trade. Are you capitalising on the tendency of history to repeat itself?
“Istanbul is becoming more and more of a hub with 52 percent of cargo we handle being in transit to an onward destination though our hub, and that percentage is increasing. The city’s main selling point as a hub is its central geographic position on established trading lanes that are hundreds of years old. We are well aware of our ideal geographic position.”
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