Finnair enjoys strong start to 2006

Finnair scheduled traffic increased in January 2006, by 12% compared to last year. Passenger load factor was 66.8%, up 1.8 percentage points, while the number of passengers carried was 562,100, up 8.7%. Asian traffic increased by 36.5%.

Traffic volume of all Finnair Group airlines, measured in passenger kilometers, increased by 8.6%. The capacity was up by 6.6%, resulting in a passenger load factor of 74.3% or 1.4 points higher than last year. All Finnair Group airlines altogether transported 657,000 passengers, which is 5.8% more than a year ago.

Finnair's Tallinn-based subsidiary Aero AS, carried 61,800 passengers (+5.4%) on routes between Helsinki and the Baltic capitals and within Southern Finland. During January, Stockholm-based FlyNordic continued to gain market share and carried 86 600 passengers (+26.4%).

Departure punctuality of scheduled flights was 83.6% (based on a fifteen minute standard), 3.9 points higher than in January 2005. Including leisure flights departure punctuality was 82% (+4 p.p). Arrival punctuality of scheduled flights was 82.6% and that of all operations was 80.7%.

Scheduled traffic

In scheduled traffic (international + domestic) revenue passenger kilometres increased by 12%. The change in capacity was + 9%. Passenger load factor was 66.8%, 1.8 percentage points higher than last year.

In scheduled international traffic, the total number of passengers was up by 13.9%. Capacity in ASKs was +10.6%, while RPKs increased by 13.8%.

In European scheduled traffic, ASKs increased by 4.6%, and as RPKs increased by 11.9%, the passenger load factor was 58.1%, up 3.8 points from previous year.

In North Atlantic scheduled traffic, capacity decreased by 44.3%. Change in RPKs was - 45.8%, and passenger load factor for January was 75.1%, 2 points lower than in 2005.

In Asian scheduled traffic, the capacity increase was 38.7%. Passenger traffic was up by 36.5% and passenger load factor 78.8%, 1.3 percentage points down.

Domestic scheduled traffic decreased by 3.5% on a capacity decrease of - 1.9%. Passenger load factor decreased by 0.8 percentage points to 52.5%.

Leisure traffic

ASKs for leisure traffic increased in January by 0.8%, and RPKs increased by 2.7%, resulting in a passenger load factor of 94.1%, 1.7 points higher than last year.

Cargo

Cargo traffic increased by 4% in terms of cargo tonnes carried. Growth in scheduled traffic was +8.9%. The increase in Asian traffic was +25.4%, volume in European traffic decreased by 0.6% while North-Atlantic traffic cargo volume decreased by 18.6%. Cargo traffic carried on chartered cargo flights decreased by 20.7%. The cargo load factor was 53.1% and the cargo load factor in the Far Eastern traffic was 65.7% and in the North Atlantic traffic 73.8%.

See other recent news regarding: Travel News Asia, Finnair