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A R C H I V E S

P R O F I L E

The Prime Of Bill Spohrer

Bill Spohrer and his lovely wife, Lynn

     “Fly the ocean in a silver plane—
     See the jungle when it’s wet with rain.”
     He has done both many times.
     What’s more, the air cargo industry has known him for more than 30 years.
     When “Gentleman” Bill Spohrer came upon the scene at Miami International Airport, air cargo operations were dominated by the likes of Pan American, Slick Airways, Eastern and National Airlines.
     When he “left” four years ago, having sold the airline he founded, Challenge Air Cargo to UPS, Bill had among other things transformed what was “Corrosion Corner” at the airport into something else.
     Once upon a time, at MIA there was a collection of old Curtiss C46s, Lockheed Constellations and other itinerant, even more mysterious aircraft, which shifted uneasily with the tide of a cargo construction boom at the airport, moving in and out every night on little cat’s feet.
     “Corrosion Corner,” situated at the northwest corner of the field, is where in the early afternoon nacelles for reciprocating piston engines were strewn about the hardstand as mechanics labored under the intense South Florida sun patching up dogged old sky wagons for one more assignment as air cargo carriers.
     During the dark time early morning hours while everyone else slept, Corrosion Corner Miami was wide-awake like twelve o’ clock high, with cargo on the move.
     Here, loadmasters bark out instructions in Spanish to ground crews, as half century old cranky, sputtering engines come to life.
     Later a parade of vintage aircraft moves slowly away like silver ghosts glinting in the moonlight, laughing in throaty growls at having once more cheated a nearby crane that relentlessly chops up the less fortunate.
     Today at Miami International, where a colorful and rich part of airport history and legend are recalled, there stands a giant, around-the-clock, automated refrigerator, surrounded by the streamlined cladding of a modern air cargo transfer facility.
     Here, emblazoned with the name UPS, is a center point created by Bill Spohrer for what today is called “the cool chain.”
     Bill Spohrer saw the handwriting on the wall and ramped up Challenge Air Cargo into a new landmark for air shippers at Miami International Airport.
     Miami owes much of its standing in the world of air cargo to the shipment of perishables.
     When it comes to flowers and fish, the numbers vary, (depending on how many countries in Latin America are installing phone systems), but never the percentages.
     Miami International Airport moves more perishables than all the other airports in the USA combined.
     So UPS, who is known for having an eye for a good thing, decided to make a big entry into South America, adding service to a couple dozen destinations served by Challenge and in the process got the big, automated reefer operation located at one corner of MIA, as part of the bargain.
     After the purchase, Bill Spohrer stayed on with the UPS team at Challenge for a year to work things in for the new owners, and to basically show them the ropes in Latin America.
     After all, the man did have the plan, and he is well-known and respected everywhere.
     Bill speaks several languages, including French and Spanish. He also knows the Latin American air cargo market like the back of his hand.
     But eventually it was time to move on.
     A small bed and breakfast interest up in the panhandle area of Florida provided some focus in another area, plus an exercise in broadened horizons, not to mention a respite from aviation.
     Some work in and about Miami International to assist the World Trade Center there.
     In the first place, Gentleman Bill was the driving force that organized the Air Cargo Americas trade show a decade ago, that today is arguably the biggest event of its kind in the world.
     Air Cargo Americas currently takes place in Miami every two years and is scheduled again for this autumn.
     Mr. Spohrer also has continued some educational and government activity with the trade organization TIACA, which he is also responsible for getting organized.
     These two contributions for the future of air cargo continue to benefit from Bill’s involvement and concern, for their success.
     Bill Spohrer has always been an explorer. He enjoys discovery not from an arm chair, but out in the wild, where the “challenge” is in your face and real.
     Once he spent three months exploring the Mosquito Coast of Honduras.
     There have been other multi-month “interludes” in Bill Spohrer’s life, including an early latch up with Eugene Fodor.
     Bill traveled all over South America creating the first, truly great descriptive guide of the continent.
     As a young man he was tutored in the Latin American airline game, first by legendary Lowell Yerex who founded the TACA chain of airlines during the 1930s, and later by C.N. Shelton who took on mighty Panagra with his TAN “barefoot airlines,” providing service down the west coast of South America much in the fashion that Southwest and Jet Blue operate low-cost airlines today.
     But when the music stopped at Miami International Airport, the UPS job completed, Bill reached back across the decades to make a sentimental journey back to Saigon (Ho Chi Minh City) taking a trip to Vietnam where he had served as aide-de-camp in 1954 to the American Advisory Group commander there.
     Once again to Southeast Asia, Gentleman Bill moved about Saigon, looking for what might be left or ever became of an era out of Graham Greene’s book “The Quiet American.”
     Back to the main streets of that beautiful and still intriguing city where Bill and his lovely wife and alter-ego Lynn set up headquarters in the ante-bellum Hotel Continental with its big slow motion ceiling fans and French and American ex-patriot café society.
     “I just wanted to see if I could remember the places and times of nearly fifty years ago,” Bill said.
     Just a few weeks ago, Gentleman Bill and two companions,—lifelong friends, returned from an extended trip of discovery down the Mighty Amazon River in Brazil.
     “You hear about the Amazon River, as images of jungles and swamp wild areas are conjured by the name.
     “The truth is that the Amazon that we think we know is nothing at all like the reality of traveling through an area as big as Montana and California.
     Our trip began in Manaus. Our mode was one of the hundreds of three-deck river boats that stand for transportation in that part of the world
     “The three of us (one of the men, a travel writer is 87 years old) boarded this quite plain, but clean and well-kept river boat, not unlike the big side wheelers of the Mississippi minus the side wheel.
     “We rode first class on the top deck which costs a grand total of $18 bucks a day including meals. Of course you need to bring your own hammock which is strung up at night, up there for sleeping.
     “Bathroom facilities are exactly one unit for boys and another for the girls.
     “Meals were rice and beans with either pork or chicken.
     “But you know something?
     “We all had a great time of it.
     “We were traveling with native Brazilians who live throughout the area, as they moved from town to town on the river.
     “The local people are for the most part, quite poor. However the civility that was evident between everybody aboard our boat as we moved on the Amazon was remarkable.
     “There just was never a voice above normal decibel. Despite the close quarters everyone was just great.
     “My colleagues wrote, read books and generally got off and on the boat at every stop using the opportunity to explore a dozen small villages along the way.
     “We saw jungle and also high cliffs and bluffs, ridges and foliage reminiscent of manicured English gardens at various stages of our journey.
     “But for three weeks not one person we encountered, spoke a single word of English.
     “I must admit the contrast to everyday life was quite wonderful, not to mention the learning curve for advancing my use of the beautiful Portuguese language.
     “I also managed to learn something else. For years I have been stuffing aircraft full of freight. But when I stood wide eyed and saw how these river traders on the Amazon stuff dripping oozing crocodile skins into the lower holds of the river boats, I felt like a kid in school again.
     “Now that kind of work is the real cargo business, unadorned and right down to cases. Imagine what the people who go into those holds to retrieve the shipment of skins have to be made of, considering conditions after the skins have been packed away for a couple of days?”
     Like we said at the top, Gentleman Bill makes easy work out of discovery.
     What a wonderful quality, is that ability to keep searching and learning while willing to move outside the form.
     Right now, back in Miami with an occasional cameo quick trip to Costa Rica and other destinations south, Bill Spohrer is chairman and four square behind an important perishables conference scheduled to be held at the Sofitel this coming June 15-17, 2003.
     Organized by Vitoria Airport which located in the Basque country of northern Spain (VAT) , the three-day Miami Perishables Conference will be the first initiative in quite some time at a place as mentioned that practically can print its own money when it comes to perishables volume in the hemisphere.
     “Today there are many advantages of linking up the cool-chain between gateways.
     “Vitoria has spent a considerable amount of time, money and energy to create excellent, uncluttered new century perishables operation in Europe which can benefit shippers worldwide.
     “But Vitoria is also committed to the advancement of perishables technologies. The June conference is not an advertisement, but rather a gathering of the best and brightest in the perishables business in an atmosphere of presentations, discussions, and networking.
     “We are quite pleased that Miami International Airport has agreed to sponsor the event.”
     More information:Teqflor@aol.com.
     There is something tremendously uplifting about Gentleman Bill Spohrer.
     He is unique of all the people that we have met in our years covering air cargo.
     What he tells all of us without ever saying anything about it, is that there is always a reason to explore new horizons, or to visit old haunts and enrich our appreciation of history.
     “Just like Mike” was an oft heard phrase by kids paying tribute to the great basketball star and hero, Michael Jordan.
     For me, I am hoping for a week, a river and a hammock, to be just like Bill.

Kari's Snow Job

     Talk about building a better mousetrap—While folks down in Rio do the Bossa Nova to the gently rippling rhythms of Gilberto and the Tradewinds, folks up in Finland, up to their ying yang in snow, do the MASI Nova, to stay ahead of the storm and to easily get to where they want to be without ever lifting a shovel.
     Dreamed up in a town called Rauma (near Turku), the MASI Nova snow pusher is an absolutely ingenious design that is both practical, beautiful and ergonomically correct.

Kari Tikkanen

     MASI Nova also comes in five delicious colors.
     Now, maybe you never heard of Rauma, but like others, have heard of Trauma, when your back goes out after shoveling around the cargo shed or around the house.
     Just remember before the world got hooked up on cellphones, few people had heard of a great Finnish river called the Nokia.
     What a great idea for cargo and passenger applications in snowy climes, where a bit of whisking away the snow by shovel can lead to sore backs and worker’s comp.
     MASI Nova weighs only a couple pounds, cuts nearly a 3 foot swath in the snow and is not lifted but “pushed” along.
     Construction is hollow-core with sturdy back and sides plus a beveled tipped leading edge.
     MASI Nova patented construction is remarkable at less than $70 bucks a throw.
     The pusher can even clear the snow pile up on your front lawn if you can’t wait for spring to see the crocuses.
     Marketed in the U.S. (and anywhere else that you might like to have a pusher delivered) by Kari Tikkanen, air cargo pioneer of Finnair Cargo, MASI Nova occurred to Kari after this past winter of shoveling out from his Babylon, Long Island, New York home.
     “You really don’t need a two-cycle snow blower which may or may not start and pollutes everything.
     “Even a child can move a remarkable amount of snow with MASI Nova.
     “For commercial use, MASI Nova gets into places rampside and truckside that blowers and shovels barely affect. Storage is a breeze—the entire unit hangs up on a nail.”
     More information: FinnSmart /USA P.O. Box 726, Babylon, NY 11702. Tel: 917-518-4791. Fax 631- 422-1651.