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From Yellowknife to Inuvik to Iqaluit, BBE crews can be found on the tarmacs. As of June 6, 2008, with Yellowknife coming on board, BBE is in charge of all ground handling services for Canadian North at these airports, three of the busiest in the north. The move to provide the Yellowknife services follows BBE’s take over of the ground handling duties for Canadian North at the Iqaluit airport on April 1, 2008. “These contracts with Canadian North are a logical extension of BBE’s business. This extensive partnership with Canadian North, our Norterra sister company, reinforces our status as the north’s premier expediter,” said Gary Reid, President of BBE. “Combining these three airports, and the 2,700 charter flights a year at our private passenger terminal, we will be handling more than 10,000 flights a year now,” said Dennis Gould, Director of Operations with BBE. In Yellowknife, about 32 new employees were brought into the BBE family. “In Iqaluit, we hired the existing ground crew from the previous contractor, all 17 of them, and extended their training to include grooming and towing airplanes,” said Corey Glover, logistics coordinator at BBE Iqaluit. BBE’s contract with Canadian North for the Iqaluit operations coincided with BBE’s decision to expand east, opening a full-service office in Iqaluit at the end of 2007. “There is so much going on in Nunavut and with our experience in the North, planting a stake there made perfect sense,” said Gould. Since 1999, mineral exploration investment has increased five-fold in Nunavut. As a result, Canada’s youngest territory has an operating diamond mine, two gold and an iron ore project in the permitting stage and growing interest in known deposits of uranium, silver, nickel, and copper. It’s estimated that Nunavut has up to 15 per cent of Canada’s total petroleum reserves. Optimistically, 1,500 new mine-related jobs could be created in Nunavut over the next 10 years. The move eastward started when Canadian North called upon BBE to coordinate and support Baffinland Iron Ore Company’s Mary’s River site, back in the fall of 2007. The Mary’s River project is projected to produce 18 million tonnes of direct-shipping iron ore per year and operate for at least 25 years. European steel mills will be the primary destination for the ore. “We deal with daily flights to the mine site. We provide all logistics services, from tracking freight once they put their orders to coordinating movement for priority material to and from the mine. We also coordinate passenger flights, making sure all their contractors and employees get where they need to go on time,” said Glover. That meant adding two BBE staff on-site at Mary’s River for managing onsite logistics. Now, with Canadian North getting a portion of the medical travel contract for the Baffin region and expanding its flight services, BBE is being kept busy at their newest base. “We were running seven flights per week with the 737s, now we have ten 737 flights and have introduced 22 Dash-8 flights a week as well,” said Dave Morris, Canadian North’s Director of Airport Operations. “We needed a company that could handle all that extra traffic, and BBE has the experience and the technology to do it.” The two companies are owned by Norterra, a management and holding company owned by companies representing the Inuit of Nunavut and the Inuvialuit of the Western Arctic. “This partnership allows Canadian North to focus on flying, while we make sure shipments go where they are supposed to go, when they are supposed to get there,” said Gould. BBE is in charge of freight consolidation and loading and unloading baggage for all these flights. “It’s a solid foothold in the market. We now have the infrastructure and critical mass to be a player in the Eastern Arctic as Nunavut grows and expands,” said Gould. “And we’re looking forward to it,” he added.
Canadian North: www.canadiannorth.com
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