AER LINGUS has been left in a very healthy state following the departure of chief executive Willie Walsh to British Airways. The airline has published figures for the financial year ended 31 December 2004 which shows an operating profit increase of 29% to E107m but actual profits down to E1.2m mainly due to redundancy payments. Turnover increased slightly by 2.1% to E906m but there were some significant cost reductions and an improvement all round with passenger numbers and load factors. Over one million passengers (out of a total of 7m) were carried on transatlantic services.
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