SriLankan Airlines’ Cargo Centre at the Bandaranaike International Airport handled a record 12,078 metric tonnes or 12 million kilogrammes of freight in the month of March 2003, the highest ever throughput in the history of the Cargo Centre.

The previous highest was in November 2000, where the Cargo Centre handled 12,024 metric tonnes. SriLankan Airlines’ Cargo Centre handles all import, export and transshipment cargo through BIA, including freight for all other airlines and freighters that use Katunayake.

“We are moving steadily towards our objective of being the cargo transshipment hub in the region, “said Nalin Rodrigo, Senior Manager Cargo at SriLankan Airlines. “This is a sign that our clients and the rest of the world are confident using the Colombo hub in the global supply chain. The methods we adopt to continuously upgrade the services we provide have helped towards this achievement. Our team at the Cargo Centre have dedicated themselves over the past couple of years to building these standards and it is bearing fruit.”

Of the record amount in March 2003, transshipments by SriLankan Airlines totalled 1.67 million kilogrammes, which is also the highest ever in transshipment by SriLankan Airlines.

“Our Cargo Centre is far exceeding the capacity of the present warehouse facility in Katunayake,” said Janaka Munasinghe, Manager Cargo Operations at SriLankan Airlines. “But we have just learned that Airport and Aviation Services Sri Lanka Ltd is planning to construct another cargo terminal with an additional capacity of 100,000 metric tonnes per annum. Construction is scheduled to begin in June 2003 and be completed by the end of 2004.”

“The expansion of the Cargo Centre will project a better image of the SriLankan 'hub in the Indian Ocean,” said Rodrigo.

SriLankan Airlines’ use of an all-Airbus fleet has increased the efficiency of cargo handling, resulting in swifter movement of cargo from one flight to another due to aircraft cargo holds accommodating containers of the same dimensions. SriLankan Cargo also operates its own specialized freighter service with an Antonov AN12 aircraft to Karachi, Madras, Trivandrum, Bangalore, Male, and Gan Island.

“We are handling more transit cargo with fewer aircraft than before, which shows that the efficiency of our cargo warehouse staff has increased tremendously, and that our customers are increasing utilization of Colombo as a hub for transit cargo,” said Munasinghe.