Airbridge Cargo, a Russian airline cargo operator with a global presence and 19 Boeing 747s, chose to implement Jeppesen Crew Pairing, and use advanced mathematics for optimization of the flight sequences for their pilots (see media release from the Farnborough Airshow).
Crew Pairing optimization for cargo operations is particularly challenging for a number of reasons. Mattias Lindqvist, Product Manager at Jeppesen, explains:
”Efficiently staffing a cargo flight schedule for operators flying all over the globe, means a need to considering an enormous amount of possible combinations. The networks of these operators are staffed typically from several different crew bases, where crew availability is often misaligned with the ’center of gravity’ of the production. Furthermore, the crossing of multiple time zones when operating globally creates a need for greater management of fatigue risk, but also consider almost an infinite number of deadheading options and ground transports for positioning crew. Sometimes two or three consecutive positionings may be needed - and ideally, all flight schedules from other carriers are considered as cargo operators often fly to less frequented airports.”
“Training adds to this complexity. Crew should ideally regularly ’position’ in to locations having simulators, ideally while flying active to keep costs in check. Often, due to the long time away from base and imbalances in crew availability over the bases, there is a need of incorporating standby slots into the pairings while building them with the optimizer. The result of the above is a ’combinatorial explosion’ that only can be harnessed with advanced mathematics, and still may result in many hours of run time also for smaller fleets of some twenty tails. It is easy to understand that, with the ever-changing constraints (flight schedules, crew availability etc.), manual pairing construction, even when relying on long experience, often is outcompeted with some 5-10% on the overall objective.”
Tomas Klemets, Head of Scheduling Safety at Jeppesen, adds, ”The development in the last couple of years in cargo crew pairing optimization has been quite amazing. The improved deadhead search, and the ability to consider fatigue risk properly with biomathematical models during optimization, makes it a very compelling case for cargo operators to take a second look at benchmarking their current process against leading capabilities, quantifying the potential in improved efficiency and reduced risk. Only a couple of years ago, some of these planning problems faced at AirBridge Cargo, Cathay Pacific, UPS, etc., could not be fully solved - they were just too computationally demanding. Long term research efforts into improved algorithms are now paying off and put into action.”
Please find more information about Jeppesen Crew Pairing here.