Cathay traffic climbs in April, but load factors fall
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Cathay Pacific Airways has released the combined Cathay Pacific and Dragonair traffic figures for April 2011, which show a year-on-year rise in passenger demand, but a decline in load factors.
The Hong Kong-based airlines carried a total of 2,258,004 passengers last month – up 4.1% on the same month last year. Demand, measured in revenue passenger kilometres (RPK), increased 6.8% year-on-year, but capacity for the month, measured in available seat kilometres (ASK), expanded 11.6%. This caused average load factors to fall 3.6 percentage points to 80.3%.
The airline was boosted by its Southeast Asian routes (+15.9% in terms of RPK) and North America (+13.0%). Routes to and from Northeast Asia however, plunged 24.8% as the aftermath of the Japan disasters continued to hit demand. Routes to mainland China (+2.9%), South Asia & the Middle East (+ 1.8%) saw slight gains, while South West Pacific & South Africa remained flat (0.0%).
Cathay Pacific’s General Manager for Revenue Management, Tom Owen said; “Demand on North American and Southeast Asian routes remained strong, and regional demand from Hong Kong was given a boost by the Easter holidays. The China network was solid, improving the quality of revenues on Dragonair, while Europe rebounded off the low base last year resulting from the airspace closures. Premium demand continued to be generally firm, benefitting from the Canton Fair. The continued slump on Japan routes remains a concern, with few signs yet of material pick-up.”
For the first four months of the year, Cathay Pacific and Dragonair’s RPK increased 3.0%, with load factors averaging 79.0% – 5.4 points down year-on-year.
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