China Southern Airlines and Air New Zealand cooperated on interlining of live honey bees from Auckland, New Zealand, via Los Angeles to Vancouver.
During April and May, five shipments of live bees weighing 8.2 tonnes were transferred via LAX. The livestock interline project took four weeks.
The honey bees originated in New Zealand. They were loaded in pallets containing 18 bee queens and 60,000 bees. A lot of heat was generated due to large number of bees gathered in a limited space, thus temperature control was the biggest challenge in the handling process; the temperature was required to be between 5-10 degrees Celsius (41-50 degrees Fahrenheit).
In order to ensure the safety of the live bees, China Southern coordinated priority loading and unloading, airborne air conditioning and fast delivery at final destination.