Flying Abroad Find out which airlines fly where!

You are here: Home / News / Passenger capacity to be cut at Manchester Airport

Passenger capacity to be cut at Manchester Airport

Monday 13 Oct 2008 7:50am

Aviation industry analysts have said that Manchester Airport will almost certainly experience passenger capacity cuts this winter seasons as all airlines react cautiously to the difficult economic climate. Current information on winter schedules already shows a planned 3 per cent drop in capacity by airlines across all flights from Manchester airport. Flight Global, who performed the analysis, based it on a like for like comparison of published airline schedules for one week in October and the corresponding week in 2007. The analysis also indicates that airlines have cut the frequency of flights from Manchester airport by 7 per cent. Although a number of airlines have yet to finalise and publish their schedules, analysts at Flight Global say the figures they had access to give a strong indication of the testing times ahead for Manchester Airport. The analysts also warn that the situation may well get worse as more of the airlines serving the airport announce their winter schedules. Manchester, like most other airports, is experiencing the effects of the credit crunch and rising oil prices as fewer people choose to travel for leisure and airlines react by cutting back on capacity or the regularity of flights, and in extreme cases go out of business altogether. Manchester's passenger traffic fell by 5 per cent to 2. 4 million in August compared to the previous August, while overall traffic is down 3. 58 per cent for the financial year so far. Also in August, the number of incoming and outgoing flight movements fell by 10. 5 per cent, a fall of 2,178 movements. British Airways' decision to suspend its daily flights to New York is the most high profile capacity cut for Manchester this winter. BA attributed the decision to the fact that the route was failing to attract enough business class passengers. Jet2. com is also to cut its passenger capacity, from 36,800 seats a week in October 2007 to 21,320. Amsterdam, Milan, Paris, Prague, Valencia and Venice have been axed from this year's schedule, although Sharm El Sheikh and Sardinia have been added to the winter and summer timetables respectively. In contrast, budget airlines such as bmibaby, easyJet and Ryanair have all increased their passenger capacity for the winter schedule on the assumption that business travellers will try to save money by opting for cheaper flights. The German airline Lufthansa is using larger aircraft on its Munich and Düsseldorf routes from Manchester to increase capacity. However, the Flight Global analysis does not include the decrease in capacity the airport will now suffer after XL Airways' collapse a few weeks ago. XL Airways flew to 29 destinations from Manchester, although most of these flights were on its summer timetable only. Director of research and analysis at Manchester-based analysts ASM Chris Donlon said: 'We are not going to see increases in capacity the way things are going. The airlines are going to be more cautious in expanding capacity. ' A Manchester airport spokesman commented that: 'It is no secret the winter is going to be tough. We make no bones about that. The shape and size of that changes week by week. What is going on is entirely in line with what we had forecast. It's down on last year. '

Browse tags: #MAN #BHX #LHR #STN #LTN #LGW #LS #WW #U2 #FR #BA

Latest Related News