A pilot air freight carrier is an airline which is dedicated to the transportation of cargo and in some cases they may be a division or subsidiary of a larger passenger airline service.
The major companies known for their pilot air freight carrier services commenced trading decades ago and now have annual revenues of some $20 billion. They employ well over 100,000 staff worldwide and have access to hundreds of airports across the globe. Their main aircraft in use in order to transport pilot air freight are Airbuses, ATRs and Boeings. Aside from their all points international air hub they have other regional hubs located in strategic cities around the world and they operate an international service through their air hubs. Because of this they are able to manage the flow of goods through pilot air freight services to more than 200 countries and territories around the globe.
Often these companies will use new or recently built aircraft in order to perform pilot air freight services, whilst some companies still prefer to use the old stables such as the Boeing 707, Boeing 727 and Douglas DC-8 to name but a few. There are even some old Douglas DC-3's (now more than 60 years old) still being used in order to not just do pilot air freight runs but to transport passengers as well around the world.
In 2004 the total scheduled pilot air freight ton that was flown around the world amounted to 72,686 million and the largest of all the air freight carriers during this period had 14,579 million tons of freight. Whilst the total amount for international scheduled flights that was sent in 2004 amounted to 60,750 million ton, the domestic amount for the UK alone in this period amounted to 18,217 million tons.