Air Mode of Transportation

Air Mode of Transportation
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Air Mode of Transportation
Mobility and pillars of transport such as air and maritime stay at the core of contemporary socio-economic fabric. They underpin the key prospects such as social connections besides their impacts on other industries, including education and healthcare. With proper transportation systems, aspects such as execution of jobs, trade, and access to goods and services have been facilitated. The Air transport industry understands the needs of their consumers that range from efficiency, speed, comfort to safety. To stay competitively sustainable, key industry players have introduced changes that include strategies in operations and market segmentation initiatives. Aircraft developers have also initiated avenues of accommodating fuel efficiency besides transitioning into renewable energy sources in the industry. Put, air mode of transportation is experiencing changes that could define its future and its impacts on prospects such as supply chain and logistics as a whole.
Changes in the air mode of transport occur consistently considering the dynamism of needs in the industry. The past two decades have accommodated some of the most significant changes in the air mode of transportation (Antai & Mutshinda, 2021). The turn of the millennium was accompanied by the consolidation of the air transport industry, especially in the US, where major airlines developed strategies to instill market dominance. Some of the high-profile acquisitions at this time included American Airlines buying Transworld Airlines in 2001. This acquisition came as a response to the 1997 formation of the Star Alliance by five airlines that included Lufthansa, Scandinavian Airlines, Air Canada, Thai Airways International, and United Airlines. The alliances would be critical in dominating the targeted markets. Additionally, airlines were attempting reduced operational costs, especially with increased flexibility and code sharing within the member airlines. The changes in the US culminated with Delta Airlines, United Airlines, and American Airlines as the leading carriers in the US.
Safety is another change that dominated the early 2000s in the airline industry. Following the 9/11 attacks in New York, the government instilled measures to increase security in entry points. The Transport Security Administration (TSA) was created in 2001 to oversee security in US airports. The implications would spread globally, with other nations in Europe, Africa, and South America increasing scrutiny of the movements of people, goods, and services within their borders (Antai & Mutshinda, 2021). TSA took their role with strict measures in the US, including employing thousands of agents at airports to screen passengers and their luggage. According to Rodrigue and Bowen, follow-ups to the security directives were evident in 2006, with air passengers directed to limit the liquids that they pack in their travels. A plot to transport liquid explosives in the UK-North America route was discovered in 2006, leading to increased screening for drinks in transportation either by passengers or through cargo.
The decade following the turn of the millennium was accompanied by other significant changes that impacted air transportation. Primary among such changes was the retirement of the Concorde. The Concorde was a famous airplane whose introduction instilled a substantial shift in air passenger transport. The plane was majorly used by British Airways and Air France (ICAO, 2021). In 2003, both airlines stopped using the Concorde for their passenger flights as the cost of maintaining the supersonic jet became too high. The Concorde was also accused of noise pollution, considering its speed that superseded the speed of sound (The World Bank, 2021).
Additionally, the Concorde was losing its customer base that had complained about high ticket prices as not worth saving only a few hours across the Atlantic Ocean. The other significant development in the period was the introduction of the Boeing 787 Dreamliner that was poised to revitalize the air transport industry. The Dreamliner was introduced in 2009 and would exceed sales expectations. Part of the success that the Dreamliner experienced was based on its fuel efficiency and the reduced operational costs that would steer competitiveness among the airlines that operated the aircraft. The introduction of the Dreamliner was followed by efficient competition when Airbus introduced its smaller and fuel-efficient A350 (Zeplin, Siagian, & Ferry, 2021). The changes that saw the elimination of the Concorde and the introduction of the Dreamliner and A350 were stimulated by the need to cut operational costs through different airlines, instill fuel efficiency, and foster environmental conservation in the air transport industry.
Airfreight is the other faction of air transport that has witnessed a significant change throughout history. 1910 marked the first time when air freight was used for the first time. The move happened less than seven years after the Wright brothers developed the first powered flight (Kraft & Havlíková, 2016). The Second World War triggered an extensive use of air as a mode of transport for goods and services. In the last four years of the conflict, for instance, 650,000 tons of cargo moved between India and China (Zeplin, Siagian, & Ferry, 2021). The contemporary era of air freight began in the early 1970s, when DHL and Federal Express launched door-to-door express package services, coinciding with the first wide-body jet aircraft entering service. In the 1990s, air freight grew substantially with the advancements in same-day and next-day logistics offered by TNT, DHL, UPS, and FedEx. The industry has kept evolving, and presently, organizations such a...