Malta International Airport plc - January Traffic Statistics

On 12 February 2010 Malta International Airport plc published the January 2010 traffic results. The statistics show a 6% rise in passenger departures during the month of January to 75,195 passengers (January 2008: 70,916). The airport operator also issued a Company Announcement on 11 February revealing that total passenger movements increased by 7% during the month. Passenger traffic from UK, Italy and Spain increased by 5.7%, 7% and 140.4% respectively whilst Germany registered a decline of 11.3%. During a press conference held in January MIA announced that it is forecasting a 2.8% growth in passenger movements for 2010 (amounting to just over 3 million passengers). MIA’s CEO Mr Julian Jaegar stated that this forecast is based on the information currently available to the company on the new routes for 2010. These include the 3 new routes by Easyjet from Liverpool, Milan and Rome; Leeds Bradford and Bournemouth by Ryanair; a connection to East Midlands by BMI and summer flights to Oslo and Copenhagen from Norwegian.  Meanwhile Ryanair announced an additional route to Edinburgh starting in March and have reportedly also reached an agreement with the Government to base an aircraft in Malta and serve additional destinations.