Falling numbers "in line" with trends
BAA has today (June 10) said that sharp drops in traffic seen by most of its airports in May are "in line with recent trend".
Spanish-owned BAA owns and operates many of the UK's busiest airports. London Heathrow and Gatwick have seen 3.9% and 6.5% drops in passenger volume respectively, year-on-year.
Overall UK passenger traffic fell 7.3%. Heathrow fared better than the average, "again demonstrating the resilience and importance of Britain's international hub airport," BAA said.
"This remains consistent with the underlying traffic trends recorded since December last year, providing more evidence that demand conditions remain weak but are not changing materially."
But traffic through London Stansted fell by almost a fifth.
"Traffic at Stansted fell by 18.5%, as some airlines continued to reduce capacity in response to the difficult economic conditions," BAA said.
US traffic travelling through BAA's airports fell 9.1% in May year-on-year, well ahead of the 1.8% decline on other long haul routes.
But the most drastic fall was seen on European chartered flights into BAA's airports, with 20.5% fewer travellers year-on-year. 865,900 European charter passengers were served in May 2008, compared to just 688,100 this year.
Edinburgh was the only airport to see passenger volume increase last month at 1.4%, its second consecutive month of growth.
Gatwick traffic declined 6.5%, an improvement on trends. BAA said the Open Skies agreement, which allows greater co-operation between UK and US airlines, had strengthened summer scheduling.
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