Emirates (EK, Dubai International) has wet-leased two B747-400(F)s from Moldova's Aerotranscargo (F5, Chisinau International) to boost its SkyCargo unit's capacity.

"The two new B747-400Fs which we have leased will give us immediate capacity while we wait for delivery of five new B777-200Fs in 2024 and 2025, and ten B777-300(ER)s to roll out of our conversion program over the next five years. We believe even these additional planes will not be sufficient. By then, we'll have the MRO set up to quickly and efficiently scale up our freighter conversion programme if we needed to," Divisional Senior Vice-President (Emirates SkyCargo) Nabil Sultan said.

The airline did not disclose the identity of the operator but ch-aviation confirmed that they were operated by Aerotranscargo. Spire Aviation ADS-B shows that B747-400(BDSF)s ER-BAM (msn 24312) and ER-BBC (msn 24998) are currently operating the Dubai-Hong Kong route with high frequency, although both ply it under Aerotranscargo's own code.

ch-aviation understands that the aircraft are already flown on behalf of Emirates and will start using the 'EK' code once the wet-lease is approved by the General Civil Aviation Authority (GCAA) of the UAE, expected by the end of May 2023.

Emirates said the B747s would be used to operate out of Dubai World Central to Chicago O'Hare (3x weekly) and Hong Kong International (9x weekly).

The ch-aviation fleets module shows that the Emirates SkyCargo division currently operates eleven B777-200Fs and has a further five on firm order from the manufacturer. The carrier has also secured ten conversion slots for its own B777-300(ER)s with Israel Aerospace Industries.