Sarah Rhoads, Director of Amazon Air, has been named the 2018 Air Cargo Executive of the Year by Air Cargo World, for the integral part she played in the development of Amazon’s air cargo operation.
“2018 has certainly been a year of growth for the Amazon Air program,” Rhoads told Air Cargo World’s editor, Randy Woods, in an exclusive interview. “I’m certainly proud of all the work my team has done to get to this point.”
Air Cargo World annually recognizes the air cargo executive who has made the greatest contribution to the industry during that calendar year. The award has been presented annually since 2014. Last year, Peter Gerber, CEO of Lufthansa’s Cargo division, won the award. Sarah Rhoads is the first woman to win the Air Cargo Executive of the Year Award.
After a successful career as a pilot and flight instructor for the U.S. Navy’s carrier-based F/A-18 aircraft, Rhoads moved into operational roles at Amazon. After a number of years managing various aspects of fulfillment centers in the United States and the United Kingdom, Rhoads is now responsible for providing the leadership and vision for Amazon’s expanding air cargo network, which recently grew to 40 freighters operating out of 21 U.S.-based gateway destinations to support its customers fulfillment network, as of November.
In 2018, Amazon Air added eight 767F freighters to its fleet and seven new “gateway” destinations in Denver; Hartford; Minneapolis; Portland, Ore.; Honolulu; Miami; and the latest addition, Riverside, Calif., bringing the total to 21 gateways.
“The main goal, this year and every year, is to ensure that the carrier has the capacity necessary to fulfill Amazon’s customer promise,” Rhoads said. “We’ve been very methodical with our planning, so fortunately I wouldn’t say we’ve been particularly surprised by anything. We’ve been able to maintain stability in a year with still some fairly rapid growth.”
The award was presented to Rhoads based on input from Air Cargo World readers, as well as its editors. As part of the award, she graces the cover of Air Cargo World’s December/January issue. The feature article based on Woods’ exclusive interview is published today on http://www.aircargoworld.com.
About Air Cargo World
Air Cargo World, an award-winning publication that has been published for more than 75 years, aims to provide air logistics professionals with insightful information, data analysis, feature articles, and in-depth coverage of events and trends affecting the airfreight logistics industry. The magazine is published digitally and online at http://www.aircargoworld.com and includes a daily email newsletter. More than 50,000 industry professionals read Air Cargo World every month.
Air Cargo World is published by New York-based Royal Media, a leading specialized information and news company. Randy Woods, Editor, Air Cargo World is available for comment on this release as well as expert commentary on the global air freight market. He can be reached at rwoods(at)aircargoworld(dot)com.
From: Royal Media Group
8 West 38th St., Suite 901
New York, NY 10018
Contact: Kathryn Grant
kgrant(at)royalmedia(dot)com
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