Qantas has officially opened its new $55 million Material and Logistics Distribution Centre at Mascot in Sydney.

The 17,500 square metre facility houses components required to service Qantas’ mainline fleet.

The Executive General Manager of Qantas Engineering, Mr David Cox, said the Sydney Distribution Centre was a significant investment by Qantas in its Australian engineering and maintenance operations.

“Qantas has invested more than $300 million dollars in its engineering and maintenance operations over the last five years,” Mr Cox. “This demonstrates a strong commitment to growing our operations, upgrading existing facilities, expanding training and improving the way we do business.

“In addition to this new distribution centre, Qantas has also invested $85 million in the establishment of its new Brisbane maintenance facility and $20 million on an upgraded Roll-Royce Engine Maintenance Centre of Excellence.”

Mr Cox said the new Sydney facility would provide significant benefits for Qantas Engineering and the Qantas Group.

“This is a truly world class facility,” he said. “It will provide the operational and workplace efficiencies we have to pursue across our business that will, in turn, allow us to increase our competitiveness and better meet the needs of Qantas and our external customers.”

The centrepiece of the new facility is a high-rise Miniload Automated Storage and Retrieval System.

“Building this new facility has allowed us to take advantage of leading edge technology that includes one of the most advanced automated order processing and handling systems in Australia.

“The Miniload system comprises four stacker cranes that travel at speeds of up to 24 metres per second to retrieve around 260,000 components from storage trays in over 30,000 locations within the facility,” Mr Cox said.
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