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28 March 2024

UAE airports register record passenger growth

Dubai International handled a total of 4.308m passengers in July compared to 3.769m in July 2009, a year-on-year increase of 14.3 per cent

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By Staff

The UAE airports touched new highs in the month of July as both Dubai and Abu Dhabi airports crossed four-million and one-million milestones, respectively, in terms of passenger traffic growth.

Dubai International handled a total of 4.308 million passengers in July compared to 3.769 million in July 2009, a year-on-year increase of 14.3 per cent. The year-to-date traffic reached 26.862 million, up 16 per cent compared to 23.166 million in the corresponding period in 2009. The closest the airport has previously come to the four million mark was in March 2010 when the monthly traffic reached 3.969 million, a press statement said on Tuesday.

The largest regional traffic growth in July was recorded in Eastern Europe (up 219 per cent), Asia (up 34 per cent) and Russia & CIS (up 29 per cent). The highest passenger volumes were recorded in the Western European sector, the Gulf and the Indian Subcontinent driven by capacity increases and new routes launched by Emirates to Tokyo, Amsterdam, Prague and Madrid.

Continuing its upward trend, Dubai International reported its tenth consecutive month of double-digit cargo traffic growth as the airport handled 197,845 tonnes of freight compared to 160,289 tonnes during the same period in 2009, an increase of 23.5 per cent. Year-to-date Dubai International has handled a total of 1,299,701 tonnes of cargo, up 25.5 per cent compared to 1,035,118 tonnes during the same period last year.

“This is an important milestone that reflects the consistent growth we have seen over the past years. Compared to July 2009 Dubai International handled over half a million more passengers and we surpassed the highest ever monthly traffic total by over 300,000 passengers,” said Paul Griffiths, CEO of Dubai Airports.

“As we are experiencing such high levels of growth consistently, we will be extending our ‘Summer Mission’ programme, which we have been operating for three years now, and deploying additional service personnel across the airport to make sure that our service remains at a world class level,” said Griffiths.
 

Abu Dhabi Airports Company (Adac) on Tuesday announced that more than one million passengers travelled through the Abu Dhabi International Airport for the first time in its history in any single month.

A total of 1,008,228 passengers travelled through the airport last month, an increase of 9.2 per cent compared to the same month last year.

Aircraft movements increased by 10.1 per cent, while cargo traffic increased by 12.3 per cent, with a total of 36,755 tons transported through the airport.

Ahmed Al Haddabi, Senior Vice President Airports Operations at Adac, said: "In July, we have celebrated our busiest month to date at Abu Dhabi International Airport, and we look forward to celebrating many more milestones. The traffic growth is a reflection of the interest Abu Dhabi is attracting from international markets and its strength as a connecting hub between the East and the West, as last month, the airport recorded a significant passenger traffic increase in three major routes: the USA, which grew by 110 per cent, the Philippines, up by 47.8 per cent, and Germany, with a 19 per cent increase."

The traffic report revealed the top five city destinations for the month of July to be London, Bangkok, Cairo, Manila, and Doha, together accounting for 19.1 per cent of all traffic at Abu Dhabi International Airport.

The July results indicates that North America was the region witnessing the largest growth as passengers traffic grew by 76 per cent in July, followed by Southern Africa with a 27 per cent increase, and Europe in third place, up by 15 per cent compared to the same month in 2009.