Hong Kong handles record 187,000 passengers in one day

[News_Editor]

Hong Kong handles record 187,000 passengers in one day

2012-02-20 20:23:23 GMT+7 (ICT)

HONG KONG (BNO NEWS) -- Hong Kong International Airport, one of the world's busiest airports, handled a record 187,000 passengers on January 28, aviation authorities announced on Monday. The record came days after the airport handled a single-day record of 1,057 flights.

Airport Authority Hong Kong (AA) said the airport saw a spike in passenger numbers and aircraft movements in January, mainly driven by an increase in Hong Kong resident traffic during the weeks around Chinese New Year, which is the year's biggest holiday in Hong Kong and China.

Compared to the same period last year, passenger numbers increased by 12.5 percent to 4.9 million passengers in January, with a new daily record of 187,000 passengers on January 28. Aircraft movements increased by 5.8 percent to approximately 29,000 flight in January.

But despite the strong passenger numbers and aircraft movements, cargo throughput in January declined by 17.5 percent to 275,000 tonnes as a result of sluggish seasonal demand during the Chinese New Year. Exports dropped by 20 percent while imports and transshipments decreased by 18 percent and 11 percent respectively.

AA CEO Stanley Hui Hon-chung said the mixed figures are the result of the entire Chinese New Year holidays taking place in the month of January this year. In 2011, the Chinese New Year holidays took place between late January and early February, causing the seasonal increase in passengers and flights to be spread across both months.

"The impact of Chinese New Year falling in January this year but February last year has given rise to a biased base for year-on-year comparisons," Stanley Hui Hon-chung said. "The changes in passenger and cargo traffic would be smaller were we to average out Chinese New Year's impact by looking at January and February together."

Nonetheless, Stanley Hui Hon-chung said the strong numbers are encouraging. "Although cargo is expected to be slow following a general decline last year, there have been signs of a slowdown in the rate of decline since the last quarter of 2011," he said. "Therefore, we are confident that the aviation industry's performance will continue to be vibrant in the long run."

Last year, Hong Kong International Airport handled a total of 54.5 million passengers and a total of 335,350 aircraft movements, a daily average of 918 flights and 149,315 passengers. The figures represented a year-on-year increase of 6.1 percent and 8.0 percent respectively. The amount of cargo handled in 2011 was 3.9 million tonnes, down 6.7 percent year-on-year.

Last month, the Civil Aviation Department of Hong Kong (CAD) announced that Hong Kong International Airport handled 1,057 incoming and outbound flights on January 20, setting a new daily record. The previous single-day record of 1,003 flight movements was set in late April 2011.

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