UPS struggling to fulfill holiday deliveries after deadly cargo plane crash that killed 14
Shoppers warned over UPS and Fedex ‘capacity crunch’ ahead of holidays
- UPS and FedEx are facing significant delivery challenges for the critical Christmas holiday period after their MD-11 freighter jets were grounded indefinitely.
- The grounding follows a deadly plane crash in Kentucky earlier this month, where an MD-11's engine detached during take-off, killing 14 people.
- Investigators found cracks in the structure attaching the turbofan engine to the plane's wing, prompting the FAA to ground all MD-11s and related DC-10s.
- The incident has created a “capacity crunch” for the delivery giants that rely on these older aircraft, with UPS owning 26 and FedEx 28 of the 109 remaining MD-11s. “They will adjust their networks, but at the end of the day, they were planning on flying those aircraft,” Derek Lossing, founder of logistics consulting firm Cirrus Global Advisors, told Bloomberg.
- Experts suggest the grounding could lead to the permanent retirement of the MD-11 fleet, though replacing them with newer models from Boeing and Airbus presents challenges due to long order backlogs.