The United States Postal Service (USPS) is shipping mail and parcels to ten European countries via ocean freight to address the issue of limited air transportation resulting from widespread flight cancellations and restrictions due to COVID-19, according to a postal advisory dated 23rd April.
The first batch of mail shipped to Europe in this way left JFK International Service Centre in New York for the Port of Rotterdam April 20 carrying five containers of mail weighing 32,768 kilograms to Austria, Denmark, the Czech Republic, Finland, Hungary, Poland, the Netherlands, Spain, Sweden and Switzerland. Shipping mail and parcels in this manner can delay and add uncertainty to arrival times. USPS estimates an additional seven to twelve days of transit time to cover port unloading, customs clearance, transit to a sorting facility, sorting and final transit and delivery.
In a non-COVID 19 world, ocean routes are used to return empty bags and some return to sender mail. But no US outbound mail. In February, airfreight capacity fell more than demand for the first time since 2017, as the coronavirus outbreak led to cancelled flights all over the world. The loss of belly cargo space due to a dramatic drop-off in passenger flights has brought total capacity down further and caused some airlines to convert passenger cabins to ferry cargo. But still, rates rise.
Airfreight rates between Chicago and European airports on April 20 were nearly triple their January 20 price. Unless companies globally don’t start working to their fullest capacity, delay in procurement and sending products/mails will cause a delay in the supply chain system.
