ACI Europe’s latest air traffic report for September and Q3 shows that during the third quarter of this year, passenger traffic at Europe’s airports grew by +9% – a small decline on the level in Q2 (+10.6%).

 

The airports association said there was even faster growth in the non-EU countries +15% (+13.1% in Q2), with the main drivers said to be the ‘complete recovery’ at most of Turkey’s airports, plus dynamic growth at many Russian airports, in the Ukraine, Georgia and Iceland.

 

At the same time, EU airports saw strong passenger traffic growth of +7.4%, down from the exceptional performance in the preceding quarter (+10.0% in Q2). This was said to partly reflect the catch-up growth from 2016 when terrorism dampened demand.

 

DOUBLE-DIGIT GROWTH

Continuing the pattern established earlier in the year, countries to the east of the EU bloc achieved double-digit growth, along with Cyprus, Luxembourg, Malta and Portugal.

 

The majors (Europe’s top 5 busiest airports) saw passenger traffic growing by +5.8% in Q3 – led by Istanbul-Atatürk (+11.7%) which was followed by Amsterdam-Schiphol (+6.1%), Paris-CDG (+5.7%), Frankfurt (+4.9%) and capacity constrained London-Heathrow (+1.7%).

 

Commenting on the results, Olivier Jankovec, ACI Europe Director General said: “We are now experiencing a synchronized air traffic growth dynamic in the EU and non-EU markets.

 

“This is propelling airports across Europe towards record traffic results – with EU airports in particular having expanded passenger traffic by more than 20% over the past three years. That growth also puts a lot of pressure on airport facilities and staff – with operational efficiency and quality becoming a daily challenge for many airports.”

 

‘ECONOMICS VERSUS GEOPOLITICAL RISKS…’

He added: “As long as economic conditions keep defying geopolitical risks, air traffic will continue to grow – spurred by the increasing reliance of businesses and consumers on air connectivity.

 

“The fact that economic sentiment in the EU has just reached historic highs is encouraging – even though recent spikes in oil prices are a worry.

 

“For now, disruptions to air traffic in Europe are coming from airlines having gone bust, being partially taken over, or massively cancelling flights and reducing capacity due to operating issues. Expect more impact from that on traffic figures in the coming weeks.”

 

 

ACI added that during Q3, airports welcoming more than 25m passengers per year (Group 1), airports welcoming between 10m and 25m (Group 2), those with between 5m and 10m (Group 3) and airports welcoming less than 5m (Group 4) reported average adjustments of +5.5%, +13.3%, +10.0% and +10.9%.

 

The airports that reported the highest increases in passenger traffic during Q3 were as follows:

 

GROUP 1: Moscow SVO (+19.5%), Istanbul IST (+11.7%), Istanbul SAW (+7.8%) Manchester (+7.6%) and Oslo (+7.1%);

 

GROUP 2: Antalya (+56.5%), Ankara (+33.8%), Warsaw WAW (24.2%), St Petersburg (+21.8%) and Prague (+16.8%);

 

GROUP 3: Naples (+27.5%), Keflavik (+18.8%), Kiev (+18.8%), Toulouse (+18.7%) and Catania (+16.2%);

 

GROUP 4: Grenoble (+3,470.3%), Bucharest BBU (+287.9%), Nis (+180%), Kaunas (+166.5%) and Foggia (+148.8%)

 

During September, airports welcoming more than 25m passengers per year (Group 1), airports welcoming between 10m and 25m (Group 2), those with between 5m and 10m (Group 3) and airports with less than 5m (Group 4) reported average adjustments of +5.2%, +12.0%, +10.4% and +11.3%.

 

 

The airports that reported the highest increases in passenger traffic during September were as follows:

 

GROUP 1: Moscow SVO (+15.7%), Istanbul SAW (+7.9%), Manchester MAN (+7.5%) Istanbul IST (+7.3%) and Moscow DME (+7.2%);

 

GROUP 2: Antalya (+49.8%), Ankara (+29.2%), Warsaw WAW (24%), St Petersburg (+20.5%) and Izmir (+16.4%);

 

GROUP 3: Naples (+27.9%), Keflavik (+23.9%), Kiev (+19.5%), Catania (+17.5%) and Faro (+17.4%);

 

GROUP 4: Grenoble (+2,058.1%), Foggia (+463.6%), Bucharest (+247.7%), Klagenfurt (+191.6%) and Craiova (+134%);