Frankfurt Airport achieves double-digit passenger growth

In April 2017, Frankfurt Airport (FRA) welcomed some 5.4 million passengers, representing an increase of 10.0%. Thus, for the first time since December 2011, monthly traffic achieved double-digit growth at FRA again. In addition, the previous record of April 2015 was exceeded by around 367,000 passengers. Growth was helped by the timing of the Easter holidays in April this year, which boosted travel particularly to leisure destinations in Southern Europe and North Africa. FRA’s cargo throughput (airfreight + airmail) grew by 1.9% to 185,340 metric tons in the reporting month. This increase, however, was tempered by the production slowdown during the Easter period, thus remaining below average compared to growth rates achieved in the year to date. Aircraft movements climbed by 1.5% to 39,580 takeoffs and landings. Accumulated maximum takeoff weights (MTOWs) slightly expanded by 0.4% to almost 2.5 million metric tons, thus posting a new April record. Fraport AG’s international portfolio reported positive performance across all Group airports in April 2017. Ljubljana Airport (LJU) in the capital of Slovenia recorded a 31.5% surge in traffic to 132,239 passengers. Lima Airport (LIM) in Peru welcomed about 1.6 million passengers in April 2017, an increase of 13.5%. The Twin Star airports of Varna (VAR) and Burgas (BOJ) on the Bulgarian Black Sea coast, combined, registered an increase of 35.9% to 78,165 passengers. Antalya Airport (AYT) in Turkey served almost 1.5 million passengers, representing an increase of 17.7%. Traffic at Hanover Airport (HAJ) in northern Germany advanced by 11.9% to 464,474 passengers. Pulkovo Airport (LED) in St. Petersburg, Russia, also performed well, serving some 1.1 million passengers – up 27.6 percent. At Xi’an Airport (XIY) in China, traffic increased by 14.0% to about 3.4 million passengers. Fraport’s international portfolio now comprises 14 Greek airports, which were taken over and consolidated into the Group during the course of the April 2017 reporting month. Regular reporting of traffic development for the 14 Greek airports will commence with the publication of the May 2017 traffic figures.