AirBridgeCargo Airlines (ABC), Russia’s largest cargo carrier, has delivered outsize steel structures to Japan to construct an open air cinema for the Okinawa International Movie Festival on Okinawa Island.  

Panalpina, one of the world’s leading providers of supply chain solutions, was awarded the project by a Swiss customer.  

The shipment of 11,320 kilos of steel girders needed to be delivered at short notice to ensure the cinema was ready to be part of the festival, final preparations of which were already under way. With each length of steel measuring more than 10 meters, the cargo needed to be nose-loaded onto one of AirBridgeCargo’s Boeing 747 freighters in Frankfurt for the flight to Tokyo.  

On arrival at Narita Airport in Japan, the steel was quickly cleared through customs before travelling 1,400km to the south of Japan to catch the nearest and fastest speedboat ferry to Naha on Okinawa Island.

“With this shipment, AirBridgeCargo demonstrated not only its expertise in transportation and handling of outsize and heavy cargo but also showed ability to react promptly and professionally to such a short notice request. In its early years of development ABC has gained from the expertise of its mother company, Volga-Dnepr Group, in moving outsize cargo and this knowledge continues to bring new opportunities for our business,” said Tatyana Arslanova, Executive President of ABC.

AirBridgeCargo currently operates two weekly B747 rotations from Frankfurt to Tokyo with a stopover in Moscow.