UK CAA traffic figures for February

The UK CAA has published traffic figures for February 2009.

The key Ireland - London area airports all show strong Year on Year decline in numbers for the month, even allowing for the fact that 2008 was a leap year with one extra day's traffic.

From Dublin, Gatwick traffic was up 1% YoY at 79,835. Heathrow and Stansted both showed strong negative trends with LHR down 17% to just over 121,000 passengers and Stansted down 18% to just over 57,000. In total, Dublin's traffic to the 'Big 4' London area airports was down 12% .

At Cork, Gatwick traffic was almost identical YoY, down 2% to 8,460. Heathrow and Stansted again showed strong adverse trends with LHR down 12% to 32,773 and Stansted down a similar 11% to 19,514. In total, Cork's London traffic was down 10.3% for the month.

Shannon has fared the best of the three state airports with Gatwick traffic up 26% YoY at 15,704 and Stansted growing 3% YoY to 26,342. Luton however showed a 20% reduction to 4,404. In total, Shannon's London area traffic grew 6.9% to 46,450 passengers.

Cork and Shannon may be losing some passengers to Kerry with both it's London routes to Luton and Stansted showing a 22% YoY growth over 2008 to 3,039 and 9,817 passengers respectively.

In Belfast, City Airport continues to decline on the key LHR route with numbers dropping 7% YoY to 38,149. At Belfast International, Aer Lingus figures have shown a 4% drop YoY to 16,771 which represents a load factor in the order of 57%, bearing in mind that February 2008 was the airlines first full month of service on the route.