Caring for the environment, energy efficiency and reducing the carbon footprint are at the forefront of many companies’ strategies. Iberia Airport Services has been the forerunner in this type of initiative and, as a leading agent in the handling service in Aena’s airport network, has already launched actions such as the pooling of ground equipment at PMI, REU, GRO, MAH, TFS and AGP airports, with satisfactory results.

With a view to improving sustainability and being leaders in GSE flexibility, agreements have been signed at these airports with other Ground Handling Agents (GAA) for the shared use of various families of equipment such as belts, baggage tractors, self-propelled aircraft stairs, planters, push-back or GPUs. We are also working to implement this at other airports in our network.

In addition to being an environmentally friendly system, pooling also offers a series of advantages, such as rationalising the use of equipment, achieving significant improvements in the sizing of families per fleet, in the reduction of fuel and in preventive and corrective maintenance work, thus contributing to improving the sustainability of operations and care for the environment.

Salvador López, GRO Supervisor: “It is always enriching to use different equipment and it is a way to economise on work tools. The idea of collaboration is very good”.

Ramón Guinjoan, REU Supervisor: “Given the work peaks, it is essential to be able to have the necessary equipment to deal with the operations”.

Iberia Airport Services, as part of its continuous improvement strategy, considers pooling as a way to optimise the sizing of critical families of equipment needed at each airport, discriminating the different fleets to be served in the summer or winter seasons, facilitating the improvement of productivity at a local level and contributing to the airport’s operability by providing options for handling families of ground equipment at the different airports.

Coinciding with the European Union’s Green Week and World Environment Day, Iberia Airport Services has developed a series of activities for each day, with the aim of promoting care for the environment and sustainability within our handling activity.

In this Iberia Airport Services Green Week, we want to continue raising awareness and creating environmental culture in a wide range of issues related to aviation and the airport industry in particular, such as emissions reduction, waste management, energy efficiency of equipment and facilities or circular economy, among others.

With this initiative, we aim to involve as many employees as possible and encourage active participation in environmental protection.

The proposed activities are:

• Monday, 5 June 2023: Launch of the first Digital Photography Competition, under the title “Looking towards the Environment 2023”.
• Tuesday, 6 June 2023: On-line conference, organised by EASA, with free access upon registration. Under the title “Is the aviation sector ready for the green transition?”.
• Wednesday, 7 June 2023: Short lectures related to the environment and airport activity.
• Thursday, 8 June 2023: Annual Environmental Awareness Campaign: “For a greener airport”, with new training material for all our employees.
• Friday, 9 June 2023: Illustrative videos related to our airport activity and sustainability. As a final touch, we present a collection of videos highlighting our latest sustainable actions.

At Iberia Airport Services we are committed to a greener operation, so awareness and sensitivity is key to achieving our goals.

The first United Airlines plane left Newark Airport at 5.55pm on 31 May and landed in the capital at 7.35am on 1 June

After four years without a direct flight following the suspension of this route by Delta Airlines in 2019, Malaga is now connected to New York. Now, United Airlines, the largest airline in the world at the moment, resumes this direct connection.

Starting the electrification of the fleet

Since May 22nd, we have installed in Oviedo (OVD) our first 80 V battery charger, until we have 2 units to provide service during the summer up to a maximum of 8 electric GSE equipment such as haulage tractor, conveyor belts or ladders.

Marabu, a new company that we have started to serve in our airports of XRY, AGP, TFS, SPC to destinations such as MUC and HAM.

BCN airport receives the HVC (High Customer Value) award from LATAM for the attention they give to High Value passengers. Congratulations!

Javier Zamora, XRY’s ground handling manager, collects in Frankfurt the award given by Condor for the best turnaround performance of its aircraft (Best turnaround performance shorthaul). Good job, XRY!

Granada receives the first flight of Volotea’s new route linking this city with Asturias. Welcome!

Togethering” meeting in BCN between Vueling and our colleagues at BCN airport.

Togethering” meeting at AGP between Vueling and our colleagues from Malaga airport.

Corinne Martínez, Susana Espinosa and Teresa Gutiérrez share their trajectory and the challenges they face as heads of scale.

Traveling is a pleasure that we can enjoy thanks to the work of professionals like those at Iberia. Their daily work means that we can not worry from the moment we arrive at the airport and leave our bags until we pick them up to start a new adventure.

[The woman behind the commercial success of the most profitable airline in Europe: María Jesús López]

This March 8, International Women’s Day, it is worth noting the work done by the women of the company. Since 2018, as we already have at magasIN, Iberia has launched initiatives to make female talent visible and promote the presence of women (SDG 5) at all levels.

To find out about their work, today we are talking to three Iberia stopover managers who do not talk about their career, their work, the challenges they face every day, the challenges they have overcome, and we take the opportunity to ask them for advice on traveling that they have learned thanks to to your experience.

The three heads of scale

Corinne Martínez is the manager of the San Sebastián, Vitoria and Pamplona airports, María Susana Espinosa Guardiola of the Ibiza airport and Teresa Gutiérrez Rodríguez is the manager of the La Palma airport.

None of them had thought when they were little that they would end up working in an airport. “When I was little, for me aviation was always related to vacations. And yes, the truth is that I have always liked the hustle and bustle of airports,” says Martínez.

For his part, Espinosa confessed to magasIN that he entered Iberia at the age of 18 and had never been on a plane, “but I have to admit that the world of aviation captivated me from the first moment.” Along the same lines, Gutiérrez points out that “as soon as you meet him, he hooks you up.”

They explain to us that in their work they carry out various functions that include planning and organizing human and material resources, carrying out handling (operations related to passenger transport) to the assisted companies, maintaining relations with and representing the assisted companies and ensuring compliance with safety and quality requirements by staff and subcontractors.

In addition, they emphasize that it is common in Iberia to see women in their positions. In fact, Martínez says that the last two heads of scale with whom he has worked were women. Espinosa points out that she has been on scales in which all managers were.

“When I took over as service manager in 2001, I joined a three-man team with a generation gap of approximately 20 years, but I must say that it was a great experience and I remember it very fondly,” says Gutiérrez.

Both for the manager of the San Sebastián, Vitoria and Pamplona airports, and for the manager of the Ibiza airport, the biggest challenge they face is that every day is a challenge. “A multitude of factors affect us, from the weather to a breakdown. Everything can have an impact,” says Martínez.

Gutiérrez tells us that the biggest challenge for her is “getting the motivation of each team member, so that they feel they are a fundamental part of being able to meet the expectations of our client companies.”

For them, one of the biggest challenges they have faced in their career is the change of scale. “When you already control the peculiarities of your airport, you have created links with your team, starting in a new city with new colleagues and a different operation enriches you a lot, but it is still a challenge,” says Corinne Martínez.

To this, Susana Espinosa adds that in Ibiza it is a great challenge to have enough staff. “The high rental prices make it very difficult for workers to come from the peninsula and on the island there is a large supply of work and little demand.” Although, for Teresa Gutiérrez, the biggest challenge has been dealing with the management of the pandemic and the volcanic eruption.

On the other hand, one of the best aspects of his job is the team. “The human quality of the teams at Iberia continues to surprise me on a daily basis,” says Martínez. Espinosa points out that two days are never the same. “You can go from spending a day without leaving the office planning to go to an audit of an assisted company. Sometimes it’s a bit stressful, but I love it.”

We continue talking with the three heads of scale, one by one, to find out about their trajectory, the particularities of their work and we ask them for advice on traveling.

The weather of north

Corinne Martínez arrived in Spain, after two years studying Medicine, to learn Spanish. In Alicante he found out about the Iberia entrance exams as an administrative officer and he applied. “I started in passenger service, then I was responsible for quality of the environment and relations with companies, then responsible for operational safety and, finally, head of scale since 2019.”

Currently, he is the manager of the northern airports, where the weather has a great impact. “Unscheduled activity is very important at all three airports, which requires very significant adaptability and flexibility. Still, each airport is unique.”

He explains that San Sebastián is the most seasonal, going from having three destinations in winter to nine in summer. “We also handle quite a few private flights as a major pick-up during the film festival.”

In Pamplona the activity is quite regular, although they have a peak in the San Fermines. The one in Vitoria is the only 24-hour airport in the entire region, so it has a lot of night activity, “especially with sports flights from La Liga soccer and La Liga ABC basketball.”

His travel advice: “Buying through each company’s website is the best way to be properly informed of any changes in real time.”

The summer in Ibiza

Susana Espinosa studied Law at the University of Alicante and practiced as a lawyer for several years. “I combined my studies with working at the Alicante airport as an administrative agent in the passenger area.”

In 2002 she was appointed head of the Passenger Unit. “From there I added to my responsibilities the areas of coordination and assistance to the plane, until I was appointed head of stopover in Alicante in 2013.” In 2015 she was transferred to Malaga with the same position and since 2018 she has held it at the Ibiza airport.

This is the airport with the highest seasonality in the world. “The difference is enormous, but not only at the airport, but throughout the island. The turning point is the opening and closing dates of the nightclubs, which take place between April and October,” he comments.

Activity is multiplied by four in summer, going from a daily average of 18 flights to 85. The number of workers also varies, according to the number of flights served. “In fact, the most widespread contractual figure is that of the discontinuous landline, who always works in the high season.”

Seasonality is decisive in his work. In low season they are dedicated to preparing the high season. “Starting in February and March, the companies that are going to fly in the summer begin to contact us to update procedures and from Easter the activity gradually increases, reaching its maximum level in August. Those months we are all very focused on daily operations, which is usually quite complicated.”

His advice for traveling: “Get your boarding pass well in advance. That way you can secure your seat and go to the airport with more peace of mind.” In addition, he stresses that “you have to travel with companies that guarantee good care if something unforeseen arises, for example, delays or cancellations.”

Erupting volcano

Teresa Gutiérrez has a degree in English Philology. He started at Iberia at La Palma airport in April 1988 as an administrative agent. At that time, the first charter flights began to operate at this airport.

“From then on they sent me to different training courses, both in the passenger area and in the cargo sheet and coordination, since in small airports like this the staff is versatile,” he says. Two years later, she was offered to assume the duties of supervisor and, later, head of service. Finally, in 2008, he accepted the duties of manager of this airport.

His work was greatly affected by the eruption of the La Palma volcano. “I remember it as a very difficult stage, not only in the management of the operation, but also of the people.”

She was in charge of coordinating the necessary actions with the airport manager for the flight operation to be carried out. Also informing the client companies on a daily basis of the status of the platform and almost daily planning the necessary resources to attend to incidents or for the operation of flights if the situation allowed.

The decisions that were then made were many: “Notify the pilots so that they report to the tower the state of the ash on the approach and that the tower report it to us. Record the landing of the first flight to check if it raised a trail of ash. Review the cleaning of steps and platform first thing in the morning, before the arrival of the first plane”.

“Check the individual protection equipment that each employee had to use. In addition, an alternative was sought to protect the aircraft assistance equipment from volcanic ash and it was decided to avoid, as far as possible, split schedules for personnel who lived on the side of the volcano to minimize the risk on the road, among many others,” he adds.

The most difficult thing for her was trying to put aside the worry and uncertainty that a natural disaster like this generates “in order to concentrate on work.” Also trying to keep the spirits of the workers in the middle of something that they did not know how or when it was going to end.

Facing future emergencies, he emphasizes that they learned the first measures to carry out to minimize the risks to people and aircraft.

His advice for travel: “Arriving early enough will avoid unnecessary stress and make you enjoy the trip. Another tip is not to put important items such as documentation or medicines in your checked baggage. And it is very important to identify your checked baggage.”

Iberia Airport Services, Iberia’s airports division, has a lot at stake these days. It has presented its tender for the provision of handling operations in Spain’s 41 airports. Its best assets are its capacity for innovation, its investment in achieve zero net emissions by 2025 and the experience of its team.

Today, International Women’s Day, we want to give a voice to four great women who work at the airport, at the foot of the planes, who tell us about their experience in a man’s world.They classify and load your bags, take you from the terminal to the plane and de-ice it when necessary.

Do you want to know more?

Business Insider, a reference digital media in Spain with an average circulation of 230,000 readers, has interviewed Fran López Noguera, our Director of Airport Operations, where he explains what the process for awarding AENA handling licenses consists of and our offer , whose basic pillars are innovation, sustainability and people.

“Depending on the size of the airport, there is a volume of licenses that Aena puts out to public tender and our intention is not only to maintain the operations we have today, but to increase the number of airports where we are present (29) to occupy the entire Spanish network, that is, 41 airports” says Fran.

You can see here, the complete interview (with video included).

This will be our handling business in 100 years

In addition, MagasIN magazine published an interview a few days ago with Nuria Escorihuela, Senior Manager of Commercial and Airport Transformation: “As a handling agent, sustainability is one of our commitments, with an investment of 100 million euros, especially “Renewing the ground equipment fleet to incorporate more efficient models, achieve their conversion to electric models or powered by clean energy, such as solar. This will reduce emissions and noise in the airport environment,” he explains.

Check out the full interview here.