We have been advised this afternoon, that the DHL Malaga flight has been permanently cancelled with immediate effect. They chose a national holiday in Spain to make this announcement, so many people will wake up to a problem in the morning.
For the last few weeks, freight has been trucked from Seville to Malaga, where the flight has been terminated. They were using an ATR42 to fly the Seville-Malaga leg, but the aircraft did not have a freight door, so anything to big to fit was trucked. Also on occasions the ATR only carried DHL's own freight and all third party freight was trucked.
The DHL station staff have had to wait for the truck from Seville and consequently their hours increased, for which management refuse to pay them. The loaders have also complained about difficulties in loading the ATR 42. Rumours have been around for some time that DHL are looking to shut the Malaga airport station down.
The ATR replaced a Convair 580, which it is said DHL's new owners claimed was too expensive to operate.
