Airport figures down 17% on February 2012

THE number of commercial movements at Shannon Airport in February was down by 17% on the figure for the same month in 2012.
Shannon is having a difficult start to life as an entity separate from Dublin Airport, as the poor numbers recorded in February follow a 10.7% year-on-year decline seen in January.
In February, there were 1,012 commercial movements at Shannon compared to 1,219 in the same month of last year. A certain amount of the decline can be attributed to the fact that February was one day longer in 2012 due to the leap year.
Overall, the airport saw a decline of 13.78% in commercial movements in the first two months of this year compared with the first two months of 2012.
The two other State airports also saw declines, albeit much less dramatic ones. The number of commercial movements at Cork in February was down by 2.1% year on year, while at Dublin Airport the drop was 1.6% year on year.
As recently as five years ago, Shannon had 2,234 commercial terminal movements in the month of February but since then, it has been all downhill.
By February of 2010, they were down to just 1,413, before going to 1,284 in 2011, 1,219 last year and just over 1,000 last month.
In a statement on its website, the Irish Aviation Authority said that in 2013 the number of commercial movements are likely to fall but that things should pick up over the next number of years.
“Irish air traffic is set to increase over the next seven years, according to the latest air traffic forecast published by Eurocontrol. While 2013 is forecast to be a challenging year for Irish air traffic figures, the outlook for the seven-year period is for an average of 2.5% growth per year up to 2019.
“In Europe in general for 2013, the report forecasts a traffic decline of 1.3% and cites the weakness of the economic outlook in Europe, very high oil prices, slower than expected recovery from the Arab Spring and the financial difficulties of the air traffic industry as contributing factors. In the following years up to 2019, however, economic growth is expected to return and flight growth is expected to stabilise at around 3% per year.
“Irish air traffic figures for 2013 to date would seem to confirm Eurocontrol’s forecast. Total flights in Irish airspace in February 2013 decreased by 5.3% when compared to February 2012. There was an average of 1,227 daily flights during February 2013, with the busiest day being February 22 with 1,369 flights in Irish airspace.
“There was a decrease of 6.9% in Ireland’s en-route traffic movements (flights that pass through Ireland but do not land) during February 2013, in comparison to February 2012. Similarly, North Atlantic communications flights (Europe/North America flights) saw a decrease of 7.2% in February 2013, when compared to February 2012.”