CAA provisional traffic figures for August

The UK CAA have just released the provisional passenger figures for the month of August. There are no real surprises and very little change over the July figures. The Luton figures didn't make the deadline this month so the picture is a little incomplete. On DUB-LHR, the passenger count continues the downward trend with just over 5% month on month reduction but a massive 12.7% YoY reduction. DUB-LGW again shows a large YoY growth of 21.5% and DUB-STN shows almost 9% YoY reduction for the month. In Cork, the Stansted and Gatwick routes are again showing a YoY reduction, this time of the order 5% which would seem to indicate that traffic on these routes is suffering at the hands of CRK-LHR which again showed strong growth of 16.5% YoY. In Shannon, the Gatwick route showed an 8% growth over July and continues the YoY growth of 86% resulting from the additional service on the route. SNN-STN continues to exhibit month on month growth for 2008 and for the month of August delivered 17% YoY. In August the Belfast International - LHR route was virtually static over July with a drop of just over 100 pax. We have calculated the YTD load factor for the route at 52%. YTD Aer Lingus have lost 60,600 passengers on the 4 LHR slots, which based on their own figures for average short haul fare and ancillary revenue per passenger in 2007 equates to a YTD reduction in revenue of Euro 6.1m by shifting the Shannon slots to Belfast.