Newspapers and freight on passenger flights

[Maikha Ly]

G'day all!

I flew on DJ213 from Melbourne to Adelaide this morning. I observed the aircraft's arrival, from Sydney, to the gate at 0730 prior to the formation of our flight, and noted that from the front cargo hold, the ground crew unloaded quite a substantial amount of what appeared to be newspapers, and other postal/courier freight. The following are the photos I snapped to illustrate.

http://www.theintercityplatform.com/yssy/P1060460.jpg
http://www.theintercityplatform.com/yssy/P1060461.jpg
http://www.theintercityplatform.com/yssy/P1060466.jpg

My query is a curious one. I can imagine Australian Air Express and the like can send freight by paying for the space/weight on normal RPT flights (Not just Qantas?), though is it common for Newspapers to be transported this way, and what market would they be going to?

Also out of interest, are any other forms of freight transported in this manner as well?


Many thanks!

[Rowan McKeever]

That's an interesting one... seems pointless to fly the Sydney papers into Melbourne on a pax flight that can't get in before 7.30am ("can't" because it can't leave Sydney before 6am). As you point out, who really cares about that newspaper by then anyway!? I'm curious to see someone else's insight into this!

Cheers
Rowan

[Ryan N]

Not so much the English newspapers, but some of my friends say their chinese newspapers don't get to the newsagents until about 9am.

[Tim Bowrey]

Maikha they're generally Vietnamese newspapers.

[Jayden Laing]

Guys,
The majority of the newspapers are foreign (European & Chinese languages) as well as a lot of TAB & other horse betting books come through around Melbourne Cup time!

Maikha, we get any freight from animals to machinery parts. There is often a substancial amount of freight going on all flights throughout the day however the ones with the most are the night & early morning flights!

[Mick F]

Empty space in your cargo hold is wasted money, may as well fill it up with freight etc.

Mick

[Adam P.]

I was always intrigued by the manifests for 1kg of horse semen... big horse!

[Maikha Ly]

Thanks folks for the responses! Clears many things up, particularly what newspapers they were.