Singapore Airlines added Atlanta to its freighter schedule with weekly 747-400 service that connects the city to service that stretches around the world.
The SIA Cargo flight reaches Atlanta from Singapore on a routing through Hong Kong, Anchorage and Los Angeles on Thursdays, the airline said. The return flight operates to Brussels and then Sharjah in the United Arab Emirates before returning to Singapore.
The flight brings the 12th all-cargo operator and first around-the-world connection for Atlanta Hartsfield-Jackson International Airport, which ranked 30th among the world’s airports for cargo traffic in 2008 but has seen business fall off sharply during the downturn this year.
Freight and express traffic was off 20.1 percent at Atlanta through the first nine months of 2009 compared to last year, although the tonnage fell only 5.9 percent year-over-year in September, the smallest monthly decline this year.
SIA Cargo started serving the city with ad hoc charter freighters in September and stepped the service up to a weekly scheduled operation Oct. 29.
The new freighter stop “will directly link Atlanta to its export markets in Europe, the Middle East and Asia,” said Tan Tiow Kor, senior vice president of sales and marketing at SIA Cargo.
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