End of week global passenger traffic highlights

Based on the latest flight data from Flightradar24, here are some end of week aviation recovery highlights courtesy of ICF.

The Chinese domestic flights continue to recover gradually (now at -20% vs last year, compared to -40% a month ago). However, signs of nascent recovery in Chinese international flights has stalled at around -70% compared to the same period last year.

Domestic European flights have also started to recover in the past month, now at -60% compared to -80% a month ago. International flights are still a rarity in Europe.

In mid-March the Baltic states of Estonia, Lithuania and Latvia launched the first ‘travel bubble’, opening up borders with one another. Since then, intra-Baltic flights have recovered strongly, and are now only 20% lower than a year previous.

Domestic flights in the USA are continuing their gradual recovering, in part due to the CARES Act, which obliges airlines to continue operating a reduced schedule. However, the TSA are reporting increasing passenger volumes too, now standing at around 15% of prior year compared to 6-8% of prior year volumes a month ago.

Following a strict lockdown, flights in India have begun to restart, despite rising numbers of coronavirus cases.

Finally, to finish on some good news: New Zealand – now all but clear of coronavirus – is showing strong signs of a recovery, with domestic flights now less than 40% behind last year’s volumes. 

Visit icf.com/insights/covid-19 for more COVID-19 based analysis from ICF.