Narita received 5,000 kiloliters of jet fuel from South Korea in early June amid a domestic fuel shortage. The fuel was imported by the trading house Itochu.
According to the Narita International Airport Corporation, the airport’s operator, the fuel arrived at the Port of Chiba on July 8, 2024, and is enough to operate 300 intra-Asan flights. Once the fuel underwent quality checks, it started to be transported to the airport through Yotsukaido and other oil terminals using pipelines.
The arrival of fuel from South Korea was the first time for fuel to be imported to Narita Airport’s facilities directly rather than through wholesalers.
Narita Airport and other airports in Japan have been going through a fuel shortage that resulted in 57 weekly flights worth of service expansions and launches to Tokyo Narita being postponed. Qantas was also reported to have postponed its resumption of seasonal Sydney-Sapporo flights indefinitely among other similar cases at other airports.
The issue has prompted Japan’s transport ministry to establish a task force to come up with countermeasures.
