US carriers are flying into the busiest summer in aviation history — and quietly bracing for it to break. Airlines for America projects 271 million passengers worldwide between June 1 and August 31, a 6.3% jump over last summer and the highest figure ever recorded. American Airlines alone is preparing to move 75 million customers across roughly 750,000 flights, the busiest summer in its history. This is not, executives insist, a soft demand environment. July international boo

The most consequential development for the US shipping industry this month is unfolding far from American shores — in the Strait of Hormuz, where a fragile reopening is reshaping global oil and container flows just as the domestic freight market hits historic highs. A 14-point US-Iran memorandum signed June 17, dubbed the "Islamabad Memorandum," set up a 60-day negotiating window and began easing the chokepoint that had throttled tanker traffic through the spring. But the unw

A wave of federal enforcement is colliding with an already-strained freight market, driving US truckload spot rates to the highest levels ever recorded and reshaping how shippers move goods this summer. Truckload spot rates hit an all-time record in early June, jumping nine cents per mile overnight to $3.83 per mile, the highest level ever logged. Behind the surge is a supply squeeze rather than a demand boom. Spot rates climbed on a combination of supply-side capacity tighte

Union Pacific and Norfolk Southern spent the week pressing their case to skeptical federal regulators, racing to shore up support for a tie-up that would create the first coast-to-coast freight railroad in American history. The two carriers are campaigning intensely to resolve the Surface Transportation Board's doubts that the merger's promised benefits will materialize. The board last month accepted the revised application for consideration but held the proceedings in abeyan