I must have booked tickets for my wife and I to fly to Helsinki about five months ago, for our annual holiday in Hanko (southern most town in Finland, the Pearl of the Baltic, a beautiful seaside town that dances in the sparkling waters.....I've told you how brill it is before!) And just two days before we flew off I struggled to concentrate on work, as I watched the clock at TQ Express count down until we could relax on holiday. I fought hard to complete all my quotes and other tasks so that I could leave a tidy desk. Amongst those quotes was one for 300 kilos of textiles to Osaka. Quoting based on Finnair was the logical choice for their great services to the Far East and very competitive rates. But it was only when the customer booked it shortly afterwards, for collection on the Friday afternoon, that it dawned on me that this cargo would be on the same flight as me.

I have no idea how many millions of kilos of cargo I have booked onto flights to destinations all over the world in my 30+ years career in airfreight, but in all that time I have never had the coincidence of being able to see one of 'our' shipments being loaded onto the same plane I was also booked on. There it is sitting on the dolly cart to the left while we wait in the departure gate to board the Embraer at Manchester airport.

Tags:   Finnair cargo airfreight manchester airport tqexpress exports worldwide embraer ringway helsinki hanko radisson blu hotel freight

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Virgin Atlantic Boeing 747 Jumbo meets Finnair Embraer on Ringway taxi way

Tags:   ringway manchester airport finnair virgin atlantic airliner boeing 747 embraer

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No turning back now. We're on our way to Finland (I had to completely ignore my wife who is scared stiff at take-off to take this shot)

Tags:   manchester airport ringway take off rotate finnair embraer control tower

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Flying from Manchester to Helsinki our brilliant little Finnair Embraer took us high above the town of Hanko, our sunny seaside holiday destination. Laid out before us was the Hanko peninsula and some of the 20,000 islands that make up the archipelago.

Tags:   hanko hango finland suomi archipelago islands peninsula baltic sea finnair embraer villa maija aerial birds eye view

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Driving from Helsinki to Hanko you get a glimpse of picturesque farm yards on land cleared of trees. Take the back roads and you follow gently winding roads that wander through forests and past colourful farmsteads. If you notice these bear similarities to those you see in the US mid-west, that is because so many Finns emigrated there.

Tags:   finland suomi farm

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