Cathay Pacific carried a total of 1,031,893 passengers in January 2023 reporting a rise of 4,077.9% compared with January 2022. The airline released its traffic figures for January 2023, showing positive signs as the airline continues to rebuild and restore connectivity at the Hong Kong airport.
Lavinia Lau, Chief Customer and Commercial Officersaid: “The new year got off to a positive start in January as Cathay Pacific carried more than one million passengers for the first time since the start of the pandemic. We carried on average more than 33,000 passengers per day, up from about 26,000 per day in December 2022, and operated 18% mor e capacity than we did in December. We also continued to add more destinations in January, with our Phuket and Xi’an flights resuming.”
The airline reported an increase of 3,807.3% year-on-year (Y-O-Y) in terms of revenue passenger kilometres (RPKs). The airline’s passenger load factor increased by 46.4 percentage points to 86.8%, while capacity, measured in available seat kilometres (ASKs), increased by 1,717.1% year-on-year.
In terms of cargo the airline carried 95,139 tonnes of cargo with an increase of 28.1% as compared to same time last year.
“We saw a small uptick in cargo demand prior to the Lunar New Year holiday, which was supported by more normal cross-border trucking services as the COVID-19 situation on the Chinese Mainland stabilised. This resulted in a good level of cargo being carried in the first half of January. However, as we approached the Lunar New Year period, overall demand softened as factories closed for the holidays,” said Lavinia Lau.
The airline is working hard to increase its passenger flight capacity in the coming months leading up to Easter holidays. The airline expects the demand from Chinese Mainland to grow, both point-to-point as well as connecting traffic via Hong Kong.
“We are on track to operate more than 100 return flights per week to 14 cities in the Chinese Mainland by the end of this month,” concluded Lau.