'There are times, depending on broader network needs, when we fly a Boeing 757 into Cedar Rapids.'Ī Boeing 767 cargo jet holds 15 containers in the upper bay and as many as two containers of loose packages in the aircraft's belly. 'Typically it's an Airbus A300, which is widebody freighter with a payload of 120,000 pounds. 'We fly one express flight in and out per day,' said Michael Mangeot, public relations manager at UPS Air Group. The trucks haul packages from markets throughout Iowa as far north as Mason City, and a leased small airplane is used to ferry packages from northwest Iowa to Cedar Rapids. The Cedar Rapids area generates more next-day business for UPS than Des Moines.Įach evening, UPS employees scan incoming packages from trucks into a central computer system and load them by destination into large cargo containers similar to those used by FedEx. UPS has named Cedar Rapids a 'central input point' for the company's Next Day Letter and Pak overnight freight service in the continental United States.

Many of the same reasons that FedEx Express established a station at the Eastern Iowa Airport hold true for the presence of UPS, which has operated an air cargo 'gateway' at the airport since 1987. You will begin to receive our Daily Business News updates. Thielen said consolidating the FedEx Express station eliminated trucking packages to the airport. We have close proximity to those markets and good ground transportation.'įedEx Express, which previously operated an office and distribution center at 12th Street and 33rd Avenue SW, consolidated facilities at the airport in 1998. 'We have four-lane highways to Dubuque and Mount Pleasant, and interstate highways to Moline and Waterloo. 'Cedar Rapids is about an hour and a half from Waterloo, an hour and 15 minutes from Mount Pleasant, an hour and a half from Dubuque and an hour and a half from Moline,' Thielen said.

Thielen, who has been with FedEx Express for 24 years, said Cedar Rapids is strategically located to serve a number of Eastern Iowa and western Illinois communities. The 86,000-square-foot FedEx Express facility, which opened for business in February 1998, employs about 100 people. 'Our facility is a distribution center in the morning where we distribute packages through the ground network to our markets.' 'In the evening, we transport it here with our ground network, consolidate it, interface with our air network and transport it to our national hubs,' explained John Thielen, FedEx air-side manager. Each aircraft holds 12 large shipping containers in the upper bay and the equivalent of two additional containers of loose packages in the 'belly.'

Mason city to cedar rapids airport