Grounded passenger jets are causing an unexpected bottleneck

Thousands of passenger planes have been taken out of the skies and moved into storage. That's not just a financial nightmare for airlines, it's a logistical nightmare for global shipping. About about half of the world's air cargo is transported by passenger planes that tuck shipments into the belly of the aircraft. Although many businesses and manufacturing plants are on pause, reducing overall demand for air shipments, there is still an urgent need to keep medical gear moving around the world. The sudden plunge in the number of passenger flights — a 95% drop off in flights worldwide — has caused an "immediate and severe" shortage in air cargo capacity, according to the IATA. Shipping companies, which use aircraft specifically designed to haul cargo, are flying at maximum capacity, and some companies are bringing more freighter jets into service. US passenger airlines used to have all cargo flights, but for the most part discontinued them decades ago. But airlines such as United and Delta have started once again flying dozens of cargo-only flights, some with goods stuffed into overhead bins as well as the plane's cargo hold while seats sit empty. A few foreign carriers have even strapped packages to seats or removed seating to make room for more cargo.<br/>That helps airlines bring in some badly needed revenue — though cargo flights likely won't make up much more than a tiny fraction of the money airlines are losing from the nosedive in passenger travel. And so far, those efforts haven't made up for the overall cargo capacity shortage, either, and the bottlenecks have allowed airlines and cargo carriers to charge about 30% more for shipments. In some cases, prices had even quadrupled, said Brandon Fried, executive director of the Airforwarders Association.<br/>