MASkargo, the Malaysia Aviation Group’s subsidiary, recently operated a Malaysia Airlines’ A380 aircraft to London on a cargo-only basis.
The flight MH04 departed the Kuala Lumpur International Airport (KLIA) at 9.50 am on April 28 with 26 tonnes of cargo made up of mostly e-commerce goods originating from Guangzhou, China.
“This is definitely an innovative and beyond-the-box approach on our part, as no other Airbus 380 equipped airline that we know, has done this,” MASkargo Chief Executive Officer Ibrahim Mohd Salleh said.
MASkargo freighter’s flying hours have been utilised to the maximum due to humanitarian COVID-19 relief efforts and other business demands.
“When the freighters can no longer cope, we initially innovated via the passenger-to-cargo (P2C) project where we use our A330 passenger fleet to carry cargo,” Ibrahim said adding that with the volume of cargo increasing coupled with lesser cargo capacity into Heathrow, they had no choice but to utilise the biggest aircraft in the Malaysia Airlines fleet to meet their customers’ expectations.
“The originally scheduled A350 could not cater for the volume of cargo that we need to move.”
Ibrahim said the A380 departed London Heathrow at 11.35 am on April 29, fully laden with cargo primarily made up of pharmaceutical products and mail.
The flight arrived in KLIA at 6.30 am on April 30.
“I am ecstatic that the A380 P2C rotation is a success. lt took a lot of coordination between ourselves in Kuala Lumpur, our Guangzhou office led by Oscar Chien and our London office, headed by Anita Sehgal,” Ooi Cheng Heong, MASkargo’s Regional Senior Manager informed.
“Everyone had a major role in filling up the aircraft from each end especially on the return flight with a substantial load in short notice. Our customers are happy that we managed to pull this off,” Heong added.
“This would not have been possible without the teamwork and unwavering cross support for each other within the Malaysian Aviation Group. We have more flights in the pipeline and we could not have managed them on our own,” Ibrahim expressed.
“We will keep our aircraft flying to make sure the medical and business needs of the world especially Malaysia, are fulfilled. I believe that our perseverance and innovations during this dark period will bear great results which we can all celebrate together soon. In the meantime, please stay home, stay safe and stay healthy,” the CEO noted.
