Malta International Airport plc - August Traffic Results

On 3 September, Malta International Airport plc announced the August 2010 traffic statistics. After reporting a 10.3% growth in passenger numbers during the first half of 2010 and a further 15.8% increase in July, MIA registered a 13.4% rise in passenger movements during the month of August – representing a new record high of 427,924 movements.

During the first eight months of the year passenger movements climbed 11.9%. This strong growth in passenger numbers was mainly due to the 9.3% increase in the seat capacity following the additional routes being serviced by several airlines including Ryanair, Easyjet, AirMalta, Norwegian and Bmibaby as well as the improved average seat load factor to 70.8%.

In a Company Announcement the airport operator explained that in August 2010 alone, seat capacity grew by 10.1% over the corresponding period in 2009 to a new all-time high of 536,495 seats. Furthermore the seat load factor climbed to 79.8% from the 77.4% registered in August 2009.

MIA also said that all core markets registered significant increases with Spain, Italy and France growing by 31.1%, 28.6% and 13.7% respectively whilst the UK market rose by 6.8%. Moreover, the German market, which has been underperforming, registered a 5.3% increase during the month under review.

In July, MIA had raised its passenger forecast for the second time this year to 8% as the new routes introduced in summer will also be serviced during the winter months. This increase should result in total passenger movements of 3.15 million in 2010 – a new record high for MIA following the previous record in 2008.