DHL Express will start to cut back its use of US airlift sub-contractor ABX Air next week bystopping service with 23 DC-9 freighters. This is the first operational move in the planned phased
handover of North American volumes to UPS. Astar pilots meanwhile picketed DHL US headquartersyesterday.Air Transport Services Group Inc announced that DHL will phase out its use of 23 DC-9freighters operated by ATSG’s subsidiary ABX Air starting next week. ATSG said it currentlyestimates that the removal of 23 DC-9s from DHL service will reduce ABX revenues by approximately$3 million.
The cutback is part of a cost-cutting plan DHL announced late last month to remove 39 of 55ABX Air DC-9s from service over the next 12 to 18 months. Besides the DC-9s, ABX Air operates 31Boeing 767 planes for DHL’s domestic package service. In May, DHL informed ABX Air about enteringnegotiations with UPS to contract out substantially all its domestic air network services,including the portion ABX had been handling.
“This reduction is in line with what we have planned for, and we are taking the stepsnecessary to accommodate these changes,” ATSG President and CEO Joe Hete said. “We will alsocontinue to pursue our efforts to present DHL with a flexible plan to maintain a dedicated,efficient, and customized air network in the US. At the same time, we are aggressively expandingour business with other customers, using the broad scope and capabilities of our family of five aircargo businesses,” he added.
ABX Air has been DHL’s principal business partner in the United States since August 2003,when it became an independent publicly held company as its former parent, Airborne Express, wasacquired by DHL.
Meanwhile, nearly 50 pilots of DHL’s other current US airlift partner, Miami-based Astar AirCargo, held protests outside the DHL US head office at Plantation, Florida, yesterday.
Pilots union ALPA said that pilots from other airlines also supported the protest over theUPS deal, which it claimed would “effectively put Astar out of business and eliminate over 10,000jobs”. Astar management members also joined the action, the pilots’ union claimed.
