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Air Charter Service’s Dubai office says that it is continuing to experience higher than normal growth so far this year, and attributes much of it to the on-going effects of the political problems in the Middle East.

Dmitriy Korshunov, General Manager of ACS Dubai, said: “We have done three times as much business so far this year compared to last, and a lot of this growth can be put down to the disruptions in the region. In February alone ACS’s worldwide offices arranged charters that evacuated more than 10,000 foreign nationals from Egypt, Libya and Tunisia. This continued into March and even April with our office here being ideally situated to assist coordinating a lot of our other offices’ evacuation flights.”

Korshunov continues: “A knock on effect of the unrest has meant that the Emirates, and particularly Dubai, has become an even more attractive holiday destination than usual this year, as the various troubles have put many travellers off visiting the affected countries. Millions of holidaymakers visit Egypt and Tunisia every year, so the UAE will be looking to ‘inherit’ many more of these tourists, some of whom will charter private jets and helicopters.

“Having said that, the market for private jets for business purposes is also on the up in the country - the region as a whole has recovered quicker than many around the world after the economic slump of a couple of years ago, so we are also seeing business travellers booking more and more. The Middle East is an important business hub, and chartering executive jets for travel means that businessmen can optimise their time by travelling to their own schedules.”

Air Charter Service’s Hong Kong office has completed its first few staff relocation flights out of Japan after fears over the extent of radiation leak heighten, and has arranged more.

Gavin Copus, CEO of ACS Asia Pacific, said: “On Tuesday we chartered a 400 seat Boeing 777-300 to relocate a corporate client’s staff from Tokyo to Hong Kong. Their office in Tokyo was having problems with intermittent power and the company was worried about their staff’s general well-being following the radiation leaks. We also chartered a Boeing 747 that landed yesterday. It’s not going to be the last of these sort of flights either – we have a few more booked, all flying over the coming days from the Tokyo area. Both Haneda and Narita Airports to the north of the city are open, but most people are migrating to the south and heading towards Osaka and Nagoya. We will also be repatriating various different nationalities in the coming days.”

Copus then added: “2011 is fast becoming a very busy year for evacuations. I know that some people across our worldwide offices have been working seven days a week! Since the uprisings in Egypt and then Libya, it has been non-stop for more than six weeks.”

Egypt
Air Charter Service evacuated almost 2,000 foreign nationals after the uprising began on January 25th 2011. ACS arranged 26 charters in total from both Cairo and Alexandria.

Libya
The situation in Libya was on an even greater scale – ACS evacuated more than 6,000 people from Tripoli and Sebha in the country across 34 flights. Amongst these was the last British governmental flight out of Tripoli carrying the FCO workers and final remaining Britons. ACS was not, however, involved in the heavily criticised first few British evacuation flights. The company had people on the ground in the region including in Malta where an airbridge was set up by ACS from Tripoli (only one hour away by air) to enable a speedier evacuation process.

Tunisia
ACS then conducted a further 13 flights from neighbouring Tunisia, after many people fled across the border from Libya. ACS flew more than 2,000 foreign nationals from the Tunisian airport of Djerba. The company’s cargo departments chartered aircraft into Tunis that brought in over two hundred tons of aid including tents, blankets and food.

New Zealand
Following the earthquake near Christchurch, ACS arranged an American governmental aid flight carrying search and rescue teams, as well as 65 tons of relief cargo.

Totals (excluding Japan):
Time scale: 6 weeks
Flights: 75
Passengers: 10,000+
Cargo: 300 tons

Air Charter Service has now evacuated over 4500 passengers from Libya in one of the largest and most complex evacuation operations the company has ever faced. So far the company has chartered 26 flights out of Libya with more charters yet to fly with passengers from many nationalities including, Turkish, British, American, Portuguese, Spanish, Vietnamese, Chinese and Thai.

According to reports, the number of foreign nationals looking to be evacuated in total is around 100,000. By this rationale, ACS has evacuated at least 4% of the total number of people needing to leave Libya. As many of these foreign nationals are crossing the land borders and being evacuated by ferry, ACS has played and extremely significant role in the air evacuation.

The first ACS charter out of Tripoli departed on Wednesday and was one of the first civilian charters to do so following the crisis. Members of many ACS offices including Dubai, Spain, London and New York worked together as a team to ensure the successful operation in the most difficult and chaotic of circumstances.

ACS had staff on the ground in Malta to ensure smooth transit of over 1000 passengers who we evacuated from Tripoli to their final destinations in Bangkok and Hanoi (see picture). ACS Dubai’s Dmitriy Korshunov was also in hand in Dubai International airport to greet Chinese passengers from our evacuation flight from Shebha in Libya.

Leading aircraft charter specialist, ACS, has had its first flight depart troubled Libya. The violent demonstrations in the African country have caused many to fear for their lives and flee by any means possible.

With virtually no flights departing from Tripoli and with Benghazi airport closed, this is proving difficult.

Matt Purton, Commercial Jets Director at ACS, explains some of the difficulties:
“Yesterday afternoon [22nd Feb] only 2 landing permits for chartered flights out of the 457 registered had been granted. Our Dubai office managed to obtain one yesterday evening and has operated our first flight out of the country, on an Airbus A320, carrying almost two hundred Turkish citizens to Antalya this morning. And we now have permits for four more flights, all to operate today. Across our worldwide offices we have bookings in place for more than 3,000 people and are just waiting on those permits. We are pushing these through diplomatic channels as this appears to be the only way at the moment.

“Following the violent protesting in Egypt we have helped evacuate more than 2,000 foreign nationals on chartered flights so far. As with the situation there, we are looking to take many people out of Libya to nearby safer havens such as southern Europe or the Middle East, and to continue their travel from there. Some are flying as far as the States and Asia though.

“We’re just here to help get as many people out of the affected areas as we can, and hopefully these protests will end soon.”

Air Charter Service arranges more than 5,000 charters every year, incorporating tens of thousands of flight legs, on all aircraft - private jets, larger widebody airliners and cargo aircraft.

Air Charter Service has already booked or flown charters carrying more than 2,000 foreign nationals out of Cairo, as the violence in the Egyptian capital escalates.

Although there has been reports of increased security searches on all aircraft leaving the country causing massive congestion at Cairo Airport over the weekend and during the course of the week, ACS has operated both large airliners carrying groups of passengers for embassies and tour operators, as well as businessmen on executive jets.

Jon Thompson, Director at ACS, said: “Many people are realising that the most efficient way of leaving Egypt is on a chartered aircraft. We have seen huge demand over the past week. Cairo Airport has gone as far as to bring in the army to assist with security checks, clearances and aircraft slots.

“Along with the flights that we have already performed we have many scheduled to depart in the coming days from Cairo, Alexandria and Luxor. Fortunately the situation at the airport seems to be improving and the backlog is beginning to clear a little. Whilst some of the aircraft are flying to more ‘local’ safe havens such as Dubai, Turkey and Greece, others have flown as far as the States.”

Air Charter Service arranges more than 5,000 charters every year, incorporating tens of thousands of flight legs, on all aircraft - private jets, larger widebody airliners and cargo aircraft.

Air Charter Service’s Dubai office has noticed a sharp increase in the use of private aircraft and helicopter charters for emergencies such as medical evacuations and air ambulances.

Dimtriy Korshunov, Director of ACS Middle East, commented: “Medevacs are becoming more and more common – especially from Afghanistan. Dubai is ideally placed and, in terms of the sheer number of correctly configured aircraft and facilities once they are here, has the necessary equipment to help the patients quickly and effectively.”

As brokers that are used to having to act fast, ACS can offer unparalleled service with such requests. Korshunov continued: “Most of the requests we receive at the moment for emergency medical flights come from insurance companies that specialise in air evacuations from Afghanistan. Not only are the aircraft set up to cope with such flights, but being Emirates’ aircraft on the A6 register, they face less restrictions, and it is quicker to obtain the necessary permissions and traffic rights for the movements.”

Air Charter Service is available at all hours, day or night, 24/7, which means that you are in safe hands knowing there will always be someone at the end of the phone in an emergency.

ACS’s Dubai office had record growth in 2009, despite the worldwide economic crisis, with around 50% more charter operations in comparison to 2008 and is performing even better this year so far. At the end of March the company moved to new premises, twice the size of the previous office.

As a group, Air Charter Service operated more than 4,000 charters in 2009 - performed on all types of aircraft ranging from commercial airliners and small private jet flights to cargo charters.

For any charter requirement at all please contact our team of experts: passenger@acs.ae

Air Charter Service celebrated its record year in 2009, its office in Dubai performing particularly well.

“Despite the doom and gloom surrounding the industry, the company as a whole grew extensively last year, especially in Dubai where we performed around 50% more charters in 2009 in comparison to 2008, and business shows no signs of slowing down as we head into this year”, says Tony Bauckham, managing director of ACS. “The credit crunch and worldwide economic crisis have not affected our plans for growth in the Middle East region.”

As a result Maya Tarabay has been elected to the Board of Directors of Air Charter Service Fzco, and promoted to Director Executive Jets, ACS Dubai.

“Since Maya started with us at ACS a few years ago, she has displayed the enthusiasm, determination and work ethic that epitomises the Air Charter Service spirit and we are delighted to welcome her to the Board” Bauckham added. “She is excited about the challenges that lie ahead with her new responsibilities, as she helps guide the Dubai company in particular, and indeed ACS Middle East interests in general, into even greater growth and success."

Air Charter Service’s Dubai office recently saved some falcons the effort of flying, by chartering an aircraft for them.

Dmitriy Korshunov, Director ACS Dubai, explains: “The falcons were being flown out of the U.A.E. to Rahim Yar Khan in Pakistan for a hunting expedition. They received VIP service aboard the B737 aircraft, along with their trainers. Normally any live animals that we need to fly would go on a cargo aircraft, but these well-trained birds of prey sit still long enough!”

Air Charter Service specialise in cargo aircraft charter, commercial airliner charter and private jet charter, and have a long history of flying all types of animals including dolphins, elephants and race horses.

For any charter requirement at all please contact our team of experts: passenger@acs.ae

Air Charter Service Dubai has seen massive growth so far in 2009. The entire ACS group is booming despite the economic downturn, and ACS Dubai is leading the way. August, September and October 2009 were record months for Air Charter Service’s Dubai office. The largest increase in ad-hoc charters was witnessed since operations started in the Middle East. ACS has now performed more than 3,000 charters worldwide so far this year – and, in doing so, has overtaken last year’s numbers already.

Dmitriy Korshunov, Director ACS Dubai commented: “While some companies are struggling, we have won new business as customers search for a better deal. We have also retained customers by pre-empting the economic slump and reducing our own rates in order to make money through volume increases rather than profit margin. This strategy has worked as our business is up, and our customers are getting a better deal.”

For any charter requirement please contact our team of experts: passenger@acs.ae

Dmitriy Korshunov, ACS Middle East director, recently performed a charter flight for 100 passengers to Sir Bani Yas Island – around 160 miles west of Abu Dhabi. It is the largest, natural island in the United Arab Emirates. They were flying there for the launch of a new local television channel. The island hosts a significant wildlife conservation project and is an important agricultural research centre, where giraffes from Africa and llamas from Peru roam around freely with oryx and ostriches.

Dmitriy organised a DC-9 aircraft to carry the passengers, who were a high profile delegation invited by the management of the television channel, including top level executives and CEOs from various international media organizations.

Four ACS representatives saw the flight off from the airport, whilst one travelled on the aircraft to make sure everything ran smoothly. ACS’s dedication and professionalism meant that the client was extremely happy.

For any charter requirement please contact our team of experts: passenger@acs.ae