Lo', if the damn 748 would fly over.

MDT normally sees a 747 in place of the normal UPS A300.

Spacepope wrote:

nitepilot79 wrote:

The evening UPS A300 departure from DIA/DEN doesn't seem to be supplemented due to the holidays quite yet.

Keep an eye on FedExs sweep flight soon. Probably see some diverts to ABQ or LBB.

No way, that's just Santa:)

UPS @ MHR goes from 7 flights a day to 17 a day the last 2 weeks before Xmas. UPS has a leased 747 operating SDF-MHR-SDF and 722 operating ONT-MHR-DFW. The brown tail equipment will be 757, A300, and 767.

chrisnh wrote:

Curiously I see no upgrade for PVD; just the single MEM 757 they always get.

Might be because PVD gets up to 4x 767s on peak days from Amazon now

United_fan wrote:

In years past,ROC woul get out usual 767 and an A300 or 757.

DHL 757 to ROC on Sundays

http://flightaware.com/live/flight/ATN555

I believe that UPS is up-gauging the MD-11F in Sydney to the B744F from Honolulu and lately not sure where they are going from Sydney but Seoul and Singapore, something with "s's" they have. 5X34 from HNL to SYD and departing to Seoul as 5X37 and Singapore as 5X99. Not sure what the leading factor is in the decisions for the destination but it is quite irregular.
https://www.flightradar24.com/UPS34/f950ce3

At PHL UPS will begin receiving 747s during night and day starting next week. I work the day ramp (4am-9am).

Also, rumor is work is being done to have a 747, possibly one of the new 748Fs, fly from Philly to Asia via ANC as a regular flight next year. The ramp has been expanded to the north to accommodate up to three additional 747s.

APettyJ wrote:

At PHL UPS will begin receiving 747s during night and day starting next week. I work the day ramp (4am-9am).

Also, rumor is work is being done to have a 747, possibly one of the new 748Fs, fly from Philly to Asia via ANC as a regular flight next year. The ramp has been expanded to the north to accommodate up to three additional 747s.

Thanks for the heads up. Was there a need to expand the ramp? I thought I've seen 2-3 747's parked at one time or even 3-4 MD11's parked at one time.

I noticed UPS added a 2nd ONT-PHL flight landing around 8am.

usairways85 wrote:

Thanks for the heads up. Was there a need to expand the ramp? I thought I've seen 2-3 747's parked at one time or even 3-4 MD11's parked at one time.

I noticed UPS added a 2nd ONT-PHL flight landing around 8am.

I don't believe the expansion was done for capacity reasons. SDF has taken much of the work PHL used to do. 10 or 11 years ago the night sort would see ~20 flights a night, and during peak that could go up to 32-34. Now on a nightly basis they get ten or eleven flights on the midnight sort, and during peak that number will rise up to around 20.

The new spots, on the eastern end of the ramp, will have parked aircraft facing down the main aisle of the ramp. Someone related to me how the ramp supervisor was complaining because they want him to park three 747s there during peak, whereas he wonders if he can fit two.

The sort I work Tu-Sa normally receives three MD-11s each morning except on Saturday. They come from SDF, ONT and CDG or CGN. At least one of them usually departs before my shift is up, going to CGN.

Volume should pick up for a carriers early next week due to "Cyber Monday" sales. The volume produced from that day as well as Black Friday is what has led to UPS employees being made to work on Black Friday, which is still a contractual holiday, meaning all eligible employees get paid double time plus their holiday pay. As a driver I was eligible for the double time and hub workers are too, but ramp employees just get their straight time plus the holiday.

Allee wrote:

United_fan wrote:

In years past,ROC woul get out usual 767 and an A300 or 757.

DHL 757 to ROC on Sundays

http://flightaware.com/live/flight/ATN555

Its been doing this the past 2 Sundays. I wish the weather would cooperate,I'd go see it.

United_fan wrote:

Allee wrote:

United_fan wrote:

In years past,ROC woul get out usual 767 and an A300 or 757.

DHL 757 to ROC on Sundays

http://flightaware.com/live/flight/ATN555

Its been doing this the past 2 Sundays. I wish the weather would cooperate,I'd go see it.

I heard/saw this yesterday going over my house.... I'm a mile from the airport. It stood out from the regular traffic; I heard it coming and walked over to the window to catch it just as it was going below the tree line.

Saw an FX 777 @ PHX last Monday for the first time. Great looking plane.

Looks like UPS and WGN are kicking things up a notch today, and these are just flights where the type+airline is unusual at the respective airport. Not sure all of these are "holiday rush" related, but, they're all outliers.

A pair of WGN MD11's are in unusual (to them) locations :

N411SN to MSP
N412SN to IAH

UPS upgrades:

SWF: B752 -> A306
PHX: B752 -> MD11
TPA: A306 -> B763
ORD: A306 -> MD11

New UPS flights:

MD11: DFW -MCI - IAH
B763: CLT - MIA
B752: CLT - PHL
B763: MEM - MIA
B763/752: various flights out of SBD
B763: BOS - SDF

First contractor for UPS showed up today at SDF, B744 from Kalitta, departed heading to ANC... plus a few extra afternoon outbound destinations different from normal, and several changes in gauge.

An Atlas 747 positioned from JFK to EWR and is now heading out to Louisville. Registration is N418MC. There was also a positioning flight of a UPS A306 from EWR to Harrisburg.

As for the holiday 747 goodies... will we be seeing the 747s flying on Saturday or are they going to be a M-F thing? Sadly I don't think I will be able to take off any weekday time between Thanksgiving and Christmas.

On the night sort at PHL Mondayn night there were 20 flights, double what was here just a few nights ago. New flights include MCO, CAE, an aforementioned CLT, PBI and MSP. No charters as of yet but as volume picks up that will change. It's been a while since I've experienced a peak at PHL (I just returned in August) but MCO use to get a 747 when I worked here 10 years ago.

On the night sort at PHL Monday there were 20 flights, double what was here just a few nights ago. New flights include MCO, CAE, an aforementioned CLT, PBI and MSP. No charters as of yet but as volume picks up that will change. It's been a while since I've experienced a peak at PHL (I just returned in August) but MCO got a 747 when I worked here 10 years ago.

APettyJ wrote:

usairways85 wrote:

Thanks for the heads up. Was there a need to expand the ramp? I thought I've seen 2-3 747's parked at one time or even 3-4 MD11's parked at one time.

I noticed UPS added a 2nd ONT-PHL flight landing around 8am.

I don't believe the expansion was done for capacity reasons. SDF has taken much of the work PHL used to do. 10 or 11 years ago the night sort would see ~20 flights a night, and during peak that could go up to 32-34. Now on a nightly basis they get ten or eleven flights on the midnight sort, and during peak that number will rise up to around 20.

The new spots, on the eastern end of the ramp, will have parked aircraft facing down the main aisle of the ramp. Someone related to me how the ramp supervisor was complaining because they want him to park three 747s there during peak, whereas he wonders if he can fit two.

The sort I work Tu-Sa normally receives three MD-11s each morning except on Saturday. They come from SDF, ONT and CDG or CGN. At least one of them usually departs before my shift is up, going to CGN.

Volume should pick up for a carriers early next week due to "Cyber Monday" sales. The volume produced from that day as well as Black Friday is what has led to UPS employees being made to work on Black Friday, which is still a contractual holiday, meaning all eligible employees get paid double time plus their holiday pay. As a driver I was eligible for the double time and hub workers are too, but ramp employees just get their straight time plus the holiday.

Interesting. I suspected the night bank of flights had declined in the past 10 years. The day time flights have pretty much remained the same with flights from CGN, CDG, and EMA Then the domestic flights from ONT, OAK, maybe SDF, and RFD

APettyJ wrote:

On the night sort at PHL Monday there were 20 flights, double what was here just a few nights ago. New flights include MCO, CAE, an aforementioned CLT, PBI and MSP. No charters as of yet but as volume picks up that will change. It's been a while since I've experienced a peak at PHL (I just returned in August) but MCO got a 747 when I worked here 10 years ago.

PHL-ONT typically gets the charters. During the peak there are typically 3-6 PHL-ONT flights each day.

Oh yea, the UPS rush definitely started in PHL
3x flights each PHL-RFD, ONT Tuesday
Also flights from RDU, RIC, ORD, JAX, MHT, JFK, PHX, BFI, PDX

Looks like N255CM, an ATI B762, is flying with a UPS flight number out of Miami.

WGA has 6 MD11s and a 747 for UPS this peak

wjcandee wrote:

Lightsaber:

Regarding hub bypass, they have been doing it since the beginning.

For example, in the previous schedule, I count 63 segments, of which 28 (a little less than half) were not to or from CVG. And it has been like this for a while. There always has been a significant component that wasn't going through the "hub", even when it was at ILN. (Also, remember that prior to buying cans (AAX, like DHL) and starting to sort at CVG, Amazon only cross-docked full pallets (typically PAJs) between those planes that were going through the "hub". Picking the low-hanging fruit means servicing city pairs that have significant volume between them -- often enough to fill an entire 767-300 with pallets just between them.

And...a little detail that may be of interest: Unless something has started to change recently, only the flights that go through CVG carry cans (to facilitate the sort). The rest of the flights still move netted pallets.

That is very interesting. Finding out information such as what you just provided is why I frequent a.net. That level of planning takes some work. For a 767-300 costs a bit to fly. So the route planning must be optimized...

Lightsaber

Looking at an Atlas 747 sitting on the PHL ramp right now as I pull up for work. At the movies moment not sure what it is for.

APettyJ wrote:

Looking at an Atlas 747 sitting on the PHL ramp right now as I pull up for work. At the movies moment not sure what it is for.

It's likely flying hub to hub for UPS.

HPRamper wrote:

32andBelow wrote:

HPRamper wrote:

Thanks for mentioning Alaska - in addition, technically, from Southeast Alaska, FX utilizes main-deck space. Every day, AS Cargo moves one or two SAA containers full of FX freight directly to SEA since FX no longer flies into the area.

Those ATRs dont go down there anymore? Where do they even go at this point? I know the caravans do the close in stuff.

I was surprised myself - those AS SAAs started popping up on the FX ramp a few weeks ago and I started asking around about them, and the answer was that FX had killed the SE Alaska ATR route and were now contracting AS to carry the volume. I don't know why exactly, but pure speculation here, I've also been hearing that Empire has a severe pilot shortage right now, with several ATRs sitting on the ground at GEG with nobody to fly them. Anecdotally, several SEA-based Empire pilots have quit in recent months and now the SEA station is now staffed with some GEG and PDX-based pilots.

They also got hit hard with a lot of weather cancellations/overflying and mechanicals. They even uncoupled Ketch from Juneau; with Ketch coming from Seattle and Juneau via Anchorage. A bit more shifting, and with Alaska moving to more 737-700s and now scheduled 73G cargo flights to all the milkrun cities, Fed Ex and Alaska were able to come to some better financial terms than having Empire keep the ATR 42/72s in Southeast.

wjcandee wrote:

APettyJ wrote:

Looking at an Atlas 747 sitting on the PHL ramp right now as I pull up for work. At the movies moment not sure what it is for.

It's likely flying hub to hub for UPS.

It arrived from DFW at 18:33, and went on to SDF around 23:30.

CVG got 2-752's, 2-A300's, and 1-A310 today from FedEx, normally we just see a single A300 fly MEM-CVG-SDF. Not sure if they are holiday related or not.

cvgComair wrote:

CVG got 2-752's, 2-A300's, and 1-A310 today from FedEx, normally we just see a single A300 fly MEM-CVG-SDF. Not sure if they are holiday related or not.

This week has been quite heavy package-wise and movement-wise. Combination of increased volume from earlier online shipping and staging of aircraft because of the Thanksgiving holiday and pre-peak readiness.

Time to reawaken this thread as we enter December.

Other carriers flying for FX currently -
Atlas: N419MC, N473MC, N446MC, N429MC, N475MC, N404KZ, N409MC. All 747-400. I think there's another in the system somewhere for a total of 8 but I can't find it at the moment. All seem to move through MEM naturally and outstations seeing these are LAX, SJU, HNL, STN, and CGN. Possibly more that I can't recall off the top of my head.
Kalitta: N762CK, 767-300, going to GEG shortly.
Amerijet: N316CM, 767-300, looks like they have this one on a BOS run.