Dubai Airports ups 2022 annual passenger forecast to 64.3m

WAM

Dubai Airports has increased its annual forecast for passenger traffic at Dubai International (DXB) to 64.3 million following its strong performance in the third quarter and the prospects of a stronger surge in the offing in the final three months of 2022, the UAE state-owned WAM news agency reported.

Average monthly traffic exceeded the six-million mark throughout the third quarter at DXB. The airport recorded 18.5 million passengers in Q3 2022, the first time quarterly traffic reached pre-pandemic levels.

DXB recorded 17.8 million passengers in the first quarter of 2020 before the pandemic.

“The growth in passenger traffic has been terrific throughout the year and continues to exceed our expectations by a margin,” said Paul Griffiths, CEO of Dubai Airports.

Passenger volumes at DXB recorded a triple-digit surge in the third quarter to reach 18.46 million propelling the year-to-date September traffic to 46.34 passengers, a year-on-year (YoY) increase of 167.6 percent.

The year-to-date traffic volume represents 72 percent of DXB’s pre-pandemic passenger traffic during the same period in 2019.

Impacted by the moving of all major freight operators from DXB back to Dubai World Central (DWC) in March, cargo continued to register a softening of demand in Q3 2022.

DXB recorded 397,676 tonnes of freight in the third quarter, bringing the total volume for the first nine months of 2022 to 1.31 tonnes, a YoY drop of 23.3 percent.

Flight movements in Q3 surged to 98,577 at DXB, propelling the number of flight movements recorded between January and September to 274,911, up 159.5 percent YoY.

India was DXB’s top country destination in terms of traffic volume, recording 6.8 million passengers in the first nine months of the year.

Saudi Arabia was placed second with 3.4 million passengers, followed by the UK (3.2 million passengers) and Pakistan (2.7 million passengers).

The US and Australia reported 2.2 million and 1.1 million in passenger traffic, respectively.

The top three cities by traffic were London (2 million passengers), Riyadh (1.5 million) and Mumbai (1.3 million), the report said.