Air transport is the highest achievement of modern transportation technology, also bear other modes of transport can not achieve the transportation task, in the national economic and military strategy occupies an important position, so whether in civil or military, air transport has become a vital contemporary transportation mode of transport.

1. characteristics of air transport

(1) advantages.

The speed, which is the biggest characteristic of air transport, but also other modes of transport can not be compared, the average speed of civil transport aircraft air transport in the current 800-1000 km / h, and the military fighter average speed reached 3000 km / h, the fastest fighter is X-43A supersonic experimental aircraft developed by NASA that speed reached 11260 km / h.

Second, the rate of extinction is low. Another feature of air transportation is that it has a very strong degree of protection for the goods transported, and its loss rate is far lower than that of road transportation. It is mainly due to the strict handling and handling requirements of air transportation and the short journey time of goods, while the extreme stability of air transportation during flight is the important reason for its low loss rate.

The mobility, not affected by terrain, one of the important characteristics of air transport is running in the air, so in the process of operation completely unaffected by all terrain, this feature will become the main choice of emergency rescue and emergency transportation.

The safety, which we mentioned in the introduction of railway transportation, the safety accident rate, and overall mortality is slightly lower than that of air transport, railway transport, although the accident occurred when the customer mortality rate is very high, but the overall mortality in stroke unit is much lower than that of other modes of transport, so it known as the safest mode of transportation.

(2) shortcomings.

The weather, due to the air transport operation space in the air, so the climate change impact on air transportation is huge, such as fog, typhoon, cyclone and other inclement weather on the transport is fatal, so climate factors have also become an important indicator of the impact of air transport economic efficiency.

Second, the carrying capacity is small. Because of the influence of technology and climate factors, the carrying capacity of air transportation is very limited. The largest carrying capacity of Boeing 747 now is 120 tons, which is very small relative to railway and water transportation.

(3) high transportation costs. According to the three laws of transportation, their small load and fast flight speed are the important factors that cause the high transportation cost.

2. the main operation suitable for air transportation

(1) it is suitable for transportation of goods with high value, low weight and small size. Because the carrying capacity of air transportation is small and the cost of transportation is high, the cargo suitable for air transportation must be able to bear freight and not to exceed the carrying capacity of air transportation. Therefore, most of the goods suitable for air transportation are high-tech products, luxury products and so on.

(2) suitable for emergency and rescue transportation. Because the speed of air transportation is the fastest and not affected by topography, so it is very suitable for some goods that need urgent transportation, such as flowers, medicines, fresh products, etc. At the same time, its operating characteristics are also suitable for emergency rescue transportation.

(3) it is one of the main ways of international transportation. The air transport international economic cooperation is one of the main mode of transport, the main stream of people and coriander to undertake international logistics transportation, sea transportation is the most for the international transport of goods.

3. organization form of air transport

(1) liner transport, similar to liner shipping, means fixed transportation, fixed start and stop, and mixed transportation of passengers and cargo or full cargo transportation with variable rates. As the time of arrival of the goods is more accurate, it has become the main mode of international air transportation. It is suitable for fresh products, emergency transportation and so on.

(2) charter flights, charter flights are divided into whole charters and part of the Charter.

(1) the whole package transportation, that is to rent a whole plane or multiple planes, refers to the way that the airline rents the aircraft to the lessee according to the relevant rental conditions and rates stipulated by the market supply and demand with the lessee. This method is suitable for mass transportation of emergency goods.

Part of charter transport is to rent a plane by a number of tenants, or to rent a plane's cabin to multiple tenants. This method is suitable for a small batch of less than one aircraft cabin cargo transportation.

(3) on consignment, refers to the generation of each company will turn to aviation with a common destination alone the consignor of the goods together to form a whole class of goods, and then unified cargo handling, customs clearance, and finally unified the destination and allocated to the various real consignee transportation. This way is not only cost saving, convenient procedures, but also important for early settlement of foreign exchange, so the mode of transportation is one of the main modes of transportation of import and export goods in China.