ACA Carries Cargo Torch At JFK      On March 31, the JFK Air Cargo Association held their 12th Annual Air Cargo Day in New York, with displays, an open industry meeting and luncheon hosted for over 300 people. The event worked to move the marble toward understanding industry issues, from cargo screening to dealing with new technologies. The event was upbeat despite some unseasonably cold and rainy early Spring weather.      “This year we cemented our position as perhaps the best one day air cargo expo in the world,” said ACA President Willie Mercado (Aer Lingus).      The venue was Russo’s on the Bay located in Howard Beach, Queens just across the water from John F. Kennedy International Airport.      If anybody recalled that Howard Beach was also once the home of the infamous hoodlums who used to think the cargo area of JFK was their own personal shopping mall, nobody talked much about it.      Russo’s has in the 21st century taken on a new role as the de facto meeting ground for many organizations at JFK, as the airport that was once considered the greatest in the world cannot in 2011 boast a banquet facility or hotel capable of hosting large events.

Francis Croffie, Chief Operations Supervisor, JFK Airport Operations of the Port Authority of NY & NJ (center) and Rene Espinet, (right) Vice President of Global Partnerships, Forward Air presented a scholarship check for $10,000 from the JFK Air Cargo Association to Melanie Longshore, (left) Director of Academic Support, Embry Riddle University. The scholarship is reserved for students from the New York metropolitan area. Local York College in Queens, New York also received a $10.000 check.     

     We were thinking about just how far down the quality of life for business executives at JFK has gone; it was IDL when we first arrived at the big airport.
     The people in air cargo at JFK are still great and as dedicated, hard working and willing to work for the community as ever.
     Last time we visited JFK was on Air Cargo Day, and Gerry Kash, the old cargo vet, was taking money and tickets and handing out passes.

Up Front & Personal

Another First From FlyingTypers—Now In HD

     In 2011 Jim Burnett, the Swiss WorldCargo area sales pro, replaced Gerry, who went on to his greater reward.
     As we stood looking at Jim dutifully issuing badges for air cargo day, a wave of deep emotion and nostalgia engulfed us.
     Just at the entranceway to the event, Rudy Auslander was standing with a small compact display for The JFK Chamber of Commerce.
     We have known Rudy since the early 1970s, when he was lord and master of an early example of air cargo automation set-ups as the operations guy at JAL Cargo JFK. JAL was then serving New York with B747 freighters, and they were doing it earlier than anybody else flying to the Orient.
     Rudy went on to become instrumental in developing the JFK super air cargo terminal for JAL, which stands today as a legacy to an air cargo dream, with its enclosed, computerized stacking system that stands over ten stories tall on the entrance road leading to the big airport.
     But in 2011, he is still standing up and willing to help just about anyone.
     Rudy is some beautiful human being.
     We spoke briefly to Gerald Molinelli, the cargo sales pro at Emirates SkyCargo who works on the team headed up by Ed Chism.
     Jerry was also an early JAL Cargo guy who, as a key part of Buz Whalen’s JAL USA cargo team, defined a role he still occupies quite well in 2011 at SkyCargo.
     As we walked up and down looking at the displays, a police boat suddenly whizzed by on the water beneath a picture window that runs the length of Russo’s, and we recalled when people representing Martin Scorcese called us looking for material for the movie “Goodfellas.”
     “Goodfellas” is probably the best gangster movie ever made and it included some elements of the infamous Lufthansa Cargo heist of 1978, with characters that reportedly hung around a JFK haunt called The Owl.
     We sent over copies of our book on JFK so that the movie stylists could replicate the look of the cargo area for the movie, but we politely declined any further advisory role as The Owl may serve the best veal parmigiana sandwich in the state.
     After all, we were still delivering our paper, Air Cargo News, at the airport and out in the surrounding neighborhood that even today rests and rocks easily alongside a growing commercial air cargo enterprise.
     Back inside the crowded corridor that formed the display lane for ACA JFK Expo 2011 was Joel Ditkowsky, “Mr. Customs Broker,” who has been at JFK for far longer than the 38 years we have been operating around the airport.
     Joel has aged quite well and is still out there as a member or leader of several transportation organizations, giving of himself for the betterment of air cargo.
     I can still remember climbing the stairs up into Cargo Building 80 with our newspaper every month to deliver our work and meet and talk about industry matters with Joel, who always would lean back from his desk and give a reporter a couple of minutes.
     Joel is both a mentor and a positive force for good that is building air cargo in New York.
     There were others at Russo’s on March 31, including Jim Larsen, who shepherded the Air Cargo Expo from startup a dozen years ago until he retired from air cargo a few years back.
     “I cannot believe how well organized and what a great event this has turned into,” Jim said.
     We enjoyed a wonderful day talking to people, some of whom are represented here. They are members of the JFK Air Cargo Association and they are dedicated and hopeful about air cargo enough to annually award scholarships for youngsters to attend transportation college.
     Thinking about ACA Expo 2011, we cannot help but wonder if the politically driven airport operator will get the message about the great potential of air cargo and dedicate itself to build some new facilities at JFK that are half as good as the people who work there.
     The other story here is about a study being conducted to see about the efficiency and functionality of air cargo at JFK. The study was not announced at JFK Air Cargo Day, but rather by a press release picked up in The New York Daily News, which seemed to indicate that little will change for JFK air cargo if for no other reason than the manner in which this news appeared.
     For years the politicians and Port Authority have talked and done zero to make the airport better for air cargo.
     Thankfully, The JFK Air Cargo Association will not allow them (or anybody else) to forget the great business and promise of an even greater air cargo enterprise that could land in New York.
Geoffrey/Flossie

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Robbie Anderson
President
United Cargo

History Through The Lens Of Howard Levy

     I found out that my friend Howard Levy, who happens to be the greatest aviation photographer who ever lived, died at 88.
     Howie was active from 1936 until just a couple of months ago when he left us, but maybe if there is anything to feel good about it’s that his great pictures will live forever.
     What a legacy of aviation his collections of photographs contain.
     Thankfully, Howie gave everything to NASM in Washington, which means at some point everyone will be able to access his work.
     I knew Howie from about 1975 until we lost track a decade ago.
     In the beginning of our friendship I was especially interested in his work at Floyd Bennett Field in Brooklyn, New York where he was the in-residence photographer before and after WW II, feeding pictures of aircraft and celebrities to any number of the New York Daily newspapers such as The Mirror and The Brooklyn Eagle.
     Howie and I always talked about aircraft pictures and about some of the early pilots that he knew as well.
     We worked together and he gave me a free hand to include many pictures from his private collection in two books we created: one on the history of LaGuardia Airport (1979) and the other about the history and transition of Idlewild to JFK Airport in (1981).
     As an airport historian, I always looked for and coveted his pictures that caught locations and people, but when I asked him why he shot so many basically open and simple pictures of just aircraft, Howie told me that he favored “neutral backgrounds” and that would drive me nuts.
     But then I realized that part of the genius of Howard Levy was to project in perfect light (and usually in the ultimate fantasy of black and white) such elegant and thoughtfully stark and beautiful images of aircraft.
     Look here at a couple and see if you get that same impact as well.

    Howie was there for the action shots at FBF, like the time when Howard Hughes arrived July 14, 1938, after his around the world flight in his Lockheed 14, or when band leader Harry Richman and pilot Richard “Dick” Merrill (later to be Eastern Airlines chief pilot) flew the Atlantic from FBF to London in 1936.
     “They flew aboard a single engine Vultee V1 (an early passenger aircraft; AA had 11 in their early fleet) named “Lady Peace” that was stuffed with 41,000 ping pong balls in the wings—someone thought they would help keep the craft afloat if something went wrong and they needed to ditch at sea.
     “They arrived in Wales setting a speed record for the crossing and later sold the ping pong balls and earned enough to pay for the flight,” he smiled.
     Howard Levy was also at FBF, camera in hand, the day that Lufthansa arrived August 11, 1938, non-stop all the way from Berlin via a four-engine passenger plane—a Focke Wulf 200 christened “Brandenburg.”
     “That airplane could carry 26 more people than a B314 flying boat, which was then considered state-of-the-art in the USA and had yet to launch schedules into Southampton from the still unopened La Guardia Airport, making the B314 passenger plane an antique even before the airport was finished,” Howard Levy told me.
     “We were all excited,” Howie said, “and shortly after this picture was taken the small crowd at the field and the German pilots and others who had flown in aboard the FW200 repaired to the airport restaurant and saloon and we celebrated the flight and talked about aviation for hours.”
     As he recalled the hope and excitement and thrill of that time, he added sadly:
     “Of course after that triumphant flight everything changed.”
     “Levy was an assistant editor for the US weekly Look Magazine for 25 years,” Alton K. Marsh wrote in a touching tribute to Howie in AOPA Online.
     “During that time, he recalled working with a young kid who loved photography and seemed interested in space exploration.
     “He remembered mentoring the young man until he, Stanley Kubrick, left to make movies, including 2001: A Space Odyssey.
     “Levy helped found historical societies, authored articles, and continued to photograph.
     “His work appeared in Smithsonian, AOPA Pilot, Sport Pilot, Private Pilot, Kitplanes, Pro Pilot, Jane’s, and Air Progress.
     “His pictures have appeared published in England, France, Italy, and Germany.
     “In his final decade he received three lifetime achievement awards from various organizations.
     “Just about a year ago during May 2010, he was in Delaware shooting an air-to-air photo session of a MiG-21 at age 88.
     “In late January his friend and fellow pilot, Glenn Stott, called to give him a ride to a weekly Sunday meeting at a nearby hangar.
     “There was no return call, unusual for Levy, who was also a regular at the monthly meeting of his EAA chapter.
     “Stott went to the house on Jan. 29 with Levy’s family and discovered Levy had died.”
     Howard Levy was at the airport and snapped this picture of one of only three Martin M130 aircraft ever built (another M130 was the famed Pan American Airways China Clipper) before the aircraft was prepared for shipment to Russia in 1937.
     “Today, as far we know, that aircraft has never been seen or accounted for after arriving in the Soviet Union,” Howie told me in 1979.
     Every time I look at this picture, I think of Howard Levy.
     Now we all can imagine he is out there joy riding and snapping new pictures (with neutral backgrounds) of every aircraft he ever photographed.
     Howie was always exactly where he wanted to be.
     Happy landings, old friend.
Geoffrey/Flossie

Editors Note: The Aviation Hall of Fame and Museum of New Jersey is inducting Howard Levy into The Hall of Fame at a special Dinner on Wednesday, May 11th starting at 6PM (cocktail hour) at the Fiesta Ballroom in Woodridge, NJ, only a few miles from the museum’s Teterboro Airport facility.
The event will also honor Commander of the U.S.A.F, General Norton Schwartz, who is flying up from Washington for the evening. This event honoring New Jersey residents who have distinguished themselves in aviation is attended by many members of the NJ aviation historical community as well as those involved in the various businesses at Teterboro Airport. Tickets to the dinner are $100 each. Dinner Co-Ordinator, Suzanne Haller can be reached at (201) 288-5344.
(GDA)

RE: American Airlines Women Key Cargo

Geoffrey:

At the last Global Logistics Conference in Kuala Lumpur, we had the privilege of having 3 charming ladies attend on behalf of Continental Airlines. I believe that they are still with the merged company. They were all a credit to Continental, the industry and most worthy of your attention!

Mary Beth Lepley, DSM, Wash., D.C.
Kaci.Suarez, Northeast USA Quickpak
Ditas Calugay, Regional Sales Manager Asia

Keep up the great work. I look forward to receiving each and every edition!

Regards,
Andy
Andrew Titley
Executive Director
Global Logistics Network
www.Go2GLN.com

Thanks Geoffrey,
Nice article.
Dave Brooks
President
American Airlines Cargo

Dear Dave,
You make us look good.
Geoffrey

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