Istanbul’s Atatürk Airport sees highest passenger rise among top five European airports

BRUSSELS/ISTANBUL

Istanbul’s Atatürk Airport saw the highest increase in passenger numbers in July out of all five major European airports, the European airport trade body announced on Sept. 13. 

Other airports in Turkey also showed significant increase in passenger numbers in July, including Istanbul’s Sabiha Gökçen, the Antalya Airport and Ankara’s Esenboğa, according to the report.

The performance of the top five European airports continued to improve during July, coming in at a growth of 6.3 percent, according to the report by ACI Europe, the European region of Airports Council International. 

Atatürk Airport led the league with a 17.6 percent growth in passenger numbers, followed by Amsterdam-Schiphol with 5.6 percent, Paris’s CDG with 5.4 percent, the Frankfurt Airport with 4.4 percent and London’s Heathrow with 1.2 percent. 

The report revealed that during the peak month of July, passenger traffic at all of Europe’s airports grew by an impressive average of 9.6 percent—in line with the dynamics of the previous months. 

“This performance is mainly attributable to the continued momentum in economic expansion, especially in the Eurozone, as well as contained oil prices and the return of stronger demand for air services in Russia and Turkey,” the report noted. 

“July saw Turkey not only recovering from last year’s traffic losses but also expanding further, boosted by strong demand from Russia,” it added. 

During July, airports welcoming more than 25 million passengers per year (Group 1), airports welcoming between 10 and 25 million passengers (Group 2), airports welcoming between 5 and 10 million passengers (Group 3) and airports welcoming less than five million passengers per year (Group 4) reported an average adjustment growth of 6.1 percent, 14.2 percent, 10.2 percent and 11.3 percent in a consecutive manner.

The airports that reported the highest increase in passenger traffic during July in Group 1 were Moscow’s SVO with 22.9 percent growth, Istanbul’s Atatürk with 17.6 percent and Istanbul Sabiha Gökçen with 12.7 percent. 

In Group 2, the Antalya Airport saw a 64.2 percent increase in passenger numbers, followed by Ankara’s Esenboğa with 42.2 percent, Warsaw with 24.7 percent and St. Petersburg with 23.6 percent.