The News
FedEx has launched a dedicated logistics service for aircraft engines and other oversized aerospace parts, with one team overseeing the entire process from quote to delivery.
FedEx has carried hundreds of main-deck aircraft engines, weighing thousands of tons in total, since June 2025.
“A delayed engine can impact flight schedules, aircraft availability, maintenance schedules, and operational commitments,” said Marcus Balzereit, president of FedEx Logistics.
The details
The new service brings quoting, customs clearance and shipment tracking for each engine under one FedEx team. That team prices every main-deck engine shipment and follows it from origin to destination.
The team handles regulatory compliance and customs coordination on each move.
Each engine is secured and checked under FedEx’s global operating procedures before it leaves.
A FedEx digital platform produces the quotes, sends shipment updates and keeps the documents.
FedEx is building this service at the same time engine repair shops are falling further behind. Shop turnaround times were up 35% or more for older engines and more than 150% for new-generation engines compared with before the pandemic. Each engine that goes to an outside shop has to be shipped there and back.
Grounded Pratt & Whitney GTF-powered aircraft peaked at 648 in March 2025, 28% of the GTF fleet.
Bain expects demand for engine shop visits to exceed shop capacity by more than 17% by the end of the decade.
IATA forecasts yearly shop visits for the two main new narrowbody engines, the CFM LEAP and the Pratt & Whitney GTF, to rise from about 1,600 to 1,800 in 2025 to more than 7,000 by 2040.
Those delays make every late engine expensive for an airline, which is why FedEx is selling speed and control on each move. A big engine needs the main deck of a freighter, a special cradle and an air-ride truck on the ground.
Boeing estimates an aircraft stuck on the ground for one to two hours can cost an airline $10,000 to $20,000, and sometimes up to $150,000.
Large turbofan engines weigh more than 13,700 pounds. Widebody engines reach about 22,000 pounds.
Balzereit said FedEx’s “own airline DNA” gives it a firsthand understanding of the urgency of keeping aircraft flying.
What peers are doing
Kuehne+Nagel already moves engines at a much larger published scale. The forwarder handles more than 4,000 aircraft engine movements a year with nearly 300 aerospace staff. It also opened a Rolls-Royce engine fulfilment center in Dubai in 2025.
My notes
FedEx is selling the airline side of the job. Forwarders such as Kuehne+Nagel buy space on other airlines’ freighters. FedEx flies its own main-deck fleet, so a team that books engine moves can now get a quote straight from the airline that would carry the engine.
(Photo: Unsplash)
