Coronavirus Travel Restrictions Limit Air Cargo Operations From China
New travel restrictions issued by the Department of Homeland Security in an effort to limit the spread of the coronavirus in the U.S. from China will likely further reduce the air cargo options for goods from China, said Brandon Fried, executive director of the Airforwarders Association, in a Feb. 3 interview. While the CBP and Transportation Security Administration notice on the restrictions excludes “crew, and flights carrying only cargo (i.e., no passengers or non-crew),” the major U.S. carriers -- Delta, American Airlines and United -- will all mostly stop passenger flights to and from China as a result of the travel ban. Those passenger flights generally include a significant amount of cargo, he said. Fried estimated that those passenger flights could include close to 20 percent of air cargo traffic.
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At the same time, China and some local governments in China have extended the Chinese New Year holiday, which likely reduces the volume of exports from the country, Fried said. So far, there are no restrictions on cargo related to the coronavirus concerns, a CBP spokeswoman said by email. “To my knowledge, there isn’t any cargo specific restrictions, although from what I understand, nothing is coming out of those regions of China anyways,” she said.