Airbus-owned subsidiary Skytra and IATA have formed a strategic data partnership and it has already revealed the extent of the fall in air travel since the COVID-19 pandemic.
The partnership is driven by Skytra's aim of releasing air travel indices which let airlines hedge their exposure to ticket price volatility and the resulting database is valuable or gaining industry insights, including the impact of the pandemic on the travel industry.
Skytra and IATA has published its first weekly report on the impact of the virus on regional revenues of the global airline industry. This shows that airline revenue in Asia-Pacific (APAC) in 2020 in the March 26-April 1 period has fallen 93% from the same period in 2019 as the region was first to suffer from the contagion of the virus originally detected in China. In Europe and North America (Canada-US) the decline was 102% and 96% respectively for the same period. Overall, IATA estimates that the unfolding impact of the pandemic on airlines? revenues may fall by 44% this year, or $252 billion.
This is reflected in air traffic statistics released by Finavia which show the effect of the pandemic on air traffic and airport operations. In total, the number of air passengers for all Finavia airports fell by 20.1% in the January-March period. In March, Helsinki Airport?s passenger numbers were down 57.2% compared to the same period the previous year.
In January 2020, the number of passengers was still growing moderately, following the trend from the previous year, according to the airport operator's statistics. As the coronavirus epidemic spread in Asia, the number of passengers declined significantly in February, particularly on routes to and from China. The impact of the pandemic on Finavia airports is most obvious in the statistics for March, in which the number of passengers on routes to and from China fell by 95.8% compared to the same time the previous year. As the epidemic spread to Europe, European airlines? demand decreased significantly due to restrictions imposed by the authorities and reduced travel. In March, there were about 4,000 passengers (-89.5%) on routes to and from Italy and 84,000 passengers (-56.3%) on routes to and from Spain. 298,000 passengers (-55.0%) travelled on domestic flights in March, and the number fell sharply towards the end of March as the travel restrictions imposed by the authorities came into force. The passenger numbers of network airports fell by a total of 18.7% in the January-March period. According to the current estimate, the impact of the decrease in air traffic on Finavia?s turnover will exceed 100 million euros and the company estimates that this year?s total number of passengers may be a third lower than last year?s.
To help overcome this challenging situation, Finavia has worked with its airport partners to provide tenants and partners with significant relief, as well as continuing the ongoing Helsinki Airport Development Programme for the time being "to guarantee Finland?s accessibility and competitiveness also in the future,? said Kimmo M?ki, CEO of Finavia.
Image credit: Jean Beaufort
