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Newsletter - September 2018

Message from the director

As temperatures drop, we see a commensurate ramp up (no pun intended!) in conferences, events, and meetings.

Your Board will meet today in London and, in the first week of October alone, there are 4 major events of interest to the Ground handling sector - The IATA Global Airport & Passenger Symposium in Athens, the ATAG Global Aviation Summit in Geneva, the GSE Expo in Las Vegas and the European Aviation Summit in Geneva. In the same month, we will see the Air Cargo Forum (Toronto), ULD Care Conference in Guangzhou and Ground Handling International’s Leaders Academy at London Heathrow. Apologies to any events folks if I have omitted your conference or exhibition.

I will be representing ASA, as vice-chair of the IATA Ground Operations Group (GOG) in 3 days of meetings in Montreal from 9th-11th October. As many will know, this group has replaced the IATA IGHC as the body responsible for setting policy and standards in global ground operations. The Ground handlers are outnumbered 10 - 5 in the group, but I do believe we punch above our weight!

The full agenda includes firm favourites such as IGOM, Technical Group reports, the introduction (within the EU) of formal regulation of ground handling and the wider impact. Agenda item 11 is to look at the thorny topic of indirect (consequential) loss in the event of aircraft ground damage. The industry (airline and handler) has, for many years, adopted a pragmatic approach to this topic via Article 8 of the SGHA Main Agreement. Any significant changes to this approach will potentially affect every GSP in the world…and perhaps not in a good way.

Yours Sincerely,

Jon Conway

In the News this Month

There's been much talk about the 'ramp of the future' recently and the potential impact of driverless and/or autonomous vehicles on airport operations and the ground handling sector.

It seems increasingly clear that our friends in the GSE manufacturing industry are investing considerable time and effort in the development of new or enhanced products to enable the vision to become reality. Interesting times. Click here to watch the video.

On the Blog...

What does Brexit mean for our Industry? View the article here.

New EASA Regulation: EU to Regulate Ground Handling. Learn more here.

Thinking of becoming a member?

There's never been a better time to join the ASA. Find out more about how you can become a member here.