DHL Express adding new daily ORD flights to free up CVG hub peak season capacity

Beginning next month, DHL Express will begin three new daily flights into Chicago O’Hare International Airport (ORD) to free up capacity at its Cincinnati/Northern Kentucky International Airport (CVG) hub ahead of peak season, DHL Express Americas CEO Mike Parra said at a media event this week.

The express operator will add a network flight between ORD and Leipzig/Halle Airport (LEJ) operated with an A330-200. As our sister publication Cargo Facts reported last year, DHL Express picked up five A330-200 freighters removed from the fleet of Etihad Airways in late 2017 and early 2018, which are operated for DHL Express by EAT Leipzig. According to DHL, the new LEJ-ORD service will allow DHL to expand its trucking network from ORD to Minneapolis-Saint Paul (MSP), St. Louis (STL), Grand Rapids, Mich. (GRR) and Capital City Airport (FFT) in Kentucky, and will free up capacity for about 9,500 express parcels per day at CVG.

The second new service, operating with a 777 aircraft, operates from Hong Kong (HKG) with a technical stop in Anchorage (ANC) before continuing to New York (JFK) and arriving at ORD at 3 p.m. local time. The flight returns from ORD to Incheon (ICN) and on to HKG, and will free up capacity for about 6,000 parcels per day at CVG.

The final new flight is a bypass flight between ORD and Miami (MIA) operating with a 767-200. The flight is intended to connect HKG to MIA, while also connecting MIA to the ORD-LEJ route, and is expected to free up space for another 6,000 parcels per day of CVG capacity.