MK freighter flights provide varied options

LEONARD NEILL WITH FOUR flights a week operating in a fixed day programme as well as one or two weekly charters, MK Airlines has now become the second largest carrier of air freight out of South Africa behind British Airways World Cargo. While BAWC has three scheduled freighters a week as well as cargo capacity on its daily flights out of Johannesburg and Cape Town, MK confines its operations to a fleet of seven Boeing 747 and DC8 freighters on its international service. “We had only two aircraft flying under our banner when we lost the first, the 747 which crash landed at Port Harcourt, Nigeria in November 2001,” says senior commercial executive Craig Brown. “There were more on order then, but that accident speeded things up and we now serve South Africa with three incoming flights from Europe and one from South America each week.” These, says Brown, are fixed day rather than what is normally termed scheduled flights, as they do not fly to a precise time of departure. Home base for the airline is Luxembourg. All flights travel to various West African destinations before proceeding to Johannesburg. They return to Lusaka, where MK also owns Stabo Air, a Zambia registered company, which helps arrange operators’ permits for onward transport into other African destinations. Two call at Lagos and the third at Entebbe northbound. Heavy loads from South Africa are carried to these destinations, with onward space available to Europe. Ad hoc space for direct SA-Europe bookings is, however, always available. The weekly inbound flight from South America - which originates in Luxembourg - travels northbound from Johannesburg through Lusaka and Lagos. “We sell all space directly from our offices. Some agents, like Fast International and even smaller concerns, are able to achieve rate benefits by consolidating loads, but no general sales agents are appointed by us.”