Richard Malkin at The Reichstag Berlin, 1948. Malkin’s coverage of The Berlin Airlift (1948-49) invented modern air cargo journalism.

     FlyingTypers’ Senior Contributing Editor Richard Malkin turns 103 years young today June 27, 2016.
     Richard holds the unique distinction of being the only air cargo reporter you can still talk to who covered the Berlin Airlift; with that one act, he practically invented air cargo journalism.
     Dick has lived and outlived almost everybody he has ever written about.
     He was the first air cargo editor in the first air cargo publication Air Transportation, founded in New York City in 1942.
     For us, who love this man for all his seasons of air cargo, June 27th is a shared celebration—exciting, hopeful, wonderful—and by any measure, a really big deal.


Dawn Of An Era

     Richard Malkin has stated that he entered into air cargo as a way “to buttress his bank account” until he could move on to something he loved.
     In fact, at the time he covered the Berlin Airlift in 1948 for the aforementioned publication Air Transportation, Dick had also won literary recognition and an O. Henry Award for a short story “Pico Never Forgets.”
     But apparently, commercial writing paid better, and with a young family, money at hand ruled the day.
     Malkin’s series of stories about the Berlin Airlift joined the global coverage of that epoch event, dominating Air Transportation Magazine, which was owned by John Budd (who also published The Import Export Bulletin that sold for 50 cents and was akin to today’s Zagat Survey, but for shipping). Budd can be credited in allowing Malkin free rein to cover how air cargo saved Berlin.
     Richard Malkin ruled the roost during the 1950s, ‘60s, and ‘70s, for a total of 35 years as editor of Air Transportation, which became Cargo Airlift and has switched owners a half dozen times since his era, now existing as Air Cargo World.


Saving Shannon

     Of particular note was an article Dick did about Shannon Airport during the 1950s. It drew attention to the facility’s entrance into the jet era at a critical time, when business there had slowed to a crawl.
     The power of a publication dedicated to the global air cargo industry was felt, and for his effort Malkin received the first in what has become a stream of recognition awards over the past half century, as he was named an Honorary Fellow of the Irish International Freight Association.


Malkin & Other Publications

     Samuel Morse may have invented Morse Code and The Journal of Commerce (published as a broad sheet here in New York for over a century), but Dick Malkin breathed new life into the publication. Life began again at age 65 for Malkin; he departed Cargo Airlift and teamed up with a super salesman named Marty Brennan. Together, they brought the JOC’s Air Commerce publication into air cargo big time.
     Malkin was at JOC for 13 years until, for some unknown reason, Air Commerce was abruptly put down.
     Then, as mentioned earlier, Dick joined our Air Cargo News in 1990 as Editor, serving here until 1994. During that time he was also an editor for Distribution Magazine.
     Then came Cargo Network Services, where Dick served as Editor of CNS Focus.
     Along the way, Dick Malkin found consulting, speechwriting, and editing work, all while serving as editor and chief and guiding force of an industry publication.
     For many years during his Cargo Airlift career, Dick did most of the writing for the KLM Cargo customer magazine, CargoVision.
     Dick Malkin’s long career has also included a few books worth noting, including his landmark Boxcars In The Sky from 1951.
     If you can get it (Amazon or eBay are good sources), Boxcars is a treasure, chock full of pictures and heavy-duty text that underscore Malkin’s now lifelong belief in air cargo.
     Malkin touchingly dedicated the work to his children, simply saying:
     “To Barry & Susan . . . may they live in a world where aerial boxcars carry the goods of peace.”
     But the knockout passage and a trademark “Malkinesque” twist in his otherwise technical writings, was the quoting of Lord Alfred Tennyson from “Locksley Hall” in an air cargo book.
          “For I dipt into the future, far as human eye could see,
          Saw the Vision of the world, and all the wonder that would be;
          Saw the heavens filled with commerce, argosies of magic sails,
          Pilots of the purple twilight, dropping down with costly bales….”
     “The heavens filled with commerce and pilots with costly bales are modern day reality, already accepted by the shipper, the receiver and the consumer,” Malkin wrote.
     Every time I read that passage in Boxcars, I’m glad I chose to be a writer of air cargo.

Photo 1.— Richard Malkin with his late wife Helen and son Barry.  Photo 2.—Richard and his daughter Susan.

     Some of the stuff he wrote for our Air Cargo News during his four-year tenure (a total of 48 issues), still just jumps off the page.
     As we celebrate The Malkin Century, we laud Richard Malkin's unwavering ability to reach back and remember his years spent shaping the air cargo conversation.
     He is a great example of the old truism that tells us the best way to know where you're going is by remembering where you've been.
     Happy 103rd Birthday, Richard.
Geoffrey/Flossie

“You Make Grown Man Cry” lament the Rolling Stones, as protestors gather outside N10 Downing Street last Friday. They were greeted by a weepy British Prime Minister David Cameron throwing in the towel and resigning after losing the vote in the EU Referendum.

     The Brexit vote results rolled in early Friday morning and were followed just as quickly by a tidal wave of instantaneous opinions from IATA to IAG to the food truck outside Heathrow Airport as to what an impending change to the way Europe operates might mean for them.
      If you look closely and think on it, you’ll discover that nobody knows much for sure except that things will definitely change. The stock markets took a hit and the value of the GBP nosedived Friday, but both are expected to recover.
      In terms of Brexit’s far-reaching implications, our best guess is that cargo will find a way to get where it needs to be, and airport bosses all over the EU and especially at FRA and CDG may consider investing in projects now that the UK has apparently shot itself through the foot.
      For the record, IATA thinks “it could be two years or more before these issues are fully resolved; prolonged uncertainty will influence both the magnitude and persistence of the economic impacts.”
      Heathrow Airport said:
      “Only Heathrow can help Britain be the great trading nation, connecting all regions of the U.K. to the world.
      “It is the keystone that connects businesses of every size to markets across the world as the U.K.’s only global hub airport.”
      Good luck to them.
      Less than a few hours after the Brexit shockeroo, the airport is calling for a giant building project right when the money is running away from Great Britain.
      International Consolidated Airlines Group (IAG), which includes British Airways, Iberia, and Aer Lingus, said the UK vote to leave the European Union will “not have a long term material impact on its business,” although IAG is saying that it doesn’t expect the windfall profits in 2016 that it saw last year.
      IAG shares dropped 20 percent to 421p on Friday morning after the profit warning and were the sixth-biggest faller in the FTSE 100 index, which fell 5 percent.
      EasyJet shares fell almost 20 percent to £12.35.
      So what does Brexit mean for the airlines?
      Any EU Member state disassociating itself from the European Union triggers a two-year process during which its relationships with all other EU members must be renegotiated on the basis of bilateral agreements.
      What that means for the airlines is that Air Operators Certificates must be granted on common EU standards issued and maintained by the EU Air Transport safety watchdog EASA.
      Any air carrier registered within the EU may offer services to and from other EU member states in accordance with the 1994 EU Open Skies agreement. This agreement covers rights both within the EU and third-state granted traffic rights.
      For British Airways (BA) and EasyJet (U2), this means they will have to apply for traffic rights again to and from any other European airport they wish to serve. While BA as a legacy carrier needs its intra-European network to feed the long-haul flights for itself and its sister companies Iberia (IB) and Aer Lingus (EI) (and can probably shift some of the feeder flights to them), EasyJet’s business model as a no-frills, point-to-point carrier sorely depends on free and unhindered access to the EU market—unlike its main competitor Ryanair (FR), which will not be affected since it holds an Irish registry.
      On the morning after the ballot, EasyJet’s CEO petitioned both the UK government and the European Commission to “prioritize the UK remaining part of the single EU aviation market.”
      That, however, is not likely to happen.
      Elmar Brok, EU chairman on the Committee on Foreign Affairs, has already urged that “no gifts be given to the British” and that the “UK will have to bear full responsibility for their unfortunate and short-sighted decision.”
      A highly-placed source in air cargo told FlyingTypers, "this Brexit has really caused a lot of confusion.
      “Many believe it will be a good thing in the long run.
      “Brussels seemed to have suffocated the process and decision making.”
      We did like what the UK freight forwarders group BIFA said about all of this. Their comments essentially added up to ‘wait and see,’ as in, if you don’t like what happened, just wait a minute!
      BIFA Director General Robert Keen nailed it: “Today the UK is still a member of the EU and it is too soon to start speculation on the outcome of two years plus of negotiations regarding trade deals and movement of goods.
      “We will be making sure that those undertaking the negotiations recognize the fundamental role that our members’ freight forwarding services, including customs processing, play in underpinning the movement of the UK’s visible trade with Europe.”
Geoffrey

Vol 15. No. 48
Voices At Lufthansa Cargo
Letters to the Editor for June 22, 2016
Chuckles For June 22, 2016
Siginon Roots In Africa
Will Russia Save B-747
Pow, Right In The Kisser
Beam Us Up, Fred
Female Air Races USA