Cathay Pacific Group saw the passenger load factor surpass 90% reflecting the ongoing strong demand for travel in March 2023. The Group reached 50% of pre-pandemic passenger flight capacity levels covering over 70 destinations as of the end of March.
Cathay Pacific carried a total of 1,322,180 passengers in March 2023, an increase of 4,217% compared with March 2022. The month’s revenue passenger kilometres (RPKs) increased 4,828% year-on-year. Passenger load factor increased by 44.8 percentage points to 90.4%, while capacity, measured in available seat kilometres (ASKs), increased by 2,384% year-on-year. In the first three months of 2023, the number of passengers carried increased by 3,907% against a 2,174% increase in capacity and a 4,432% increase in RPKs, as compared with the same period for 2022.
Lavinia Lau, Chief Customer and Commercial Officer, Cathay Pacific said: “Cathay Pacific’s passenger numbers continued to increase month on month in March, growing 19% to more than 1.3 million compared with February. We resumed services to three more destinations – Shanghai Hongqiao airport, Haikou and Nagoya in March. Hongqiao in particular saw huge demand for both business and leisure travel. Our Japan and South Korea flights benefited from good passenger traffic for the cherry blossom season and demand ahead of the Easter holiday. Demand between Hong Kong and Taiwan was similarly strong, including transit traffic from Taiwan to Europe and Indonesia via the Hong Kong hub.”
The airline carried 121,776 tonnes of cargo last month, an increase of 25.3% compared with March 2022.
Reflecting on the upcoming months, Lau added: “Regarding our travel business, we continued to see strong demand into the Easter holidays, reflecting positive and robust sentiment for travel. On 9 April, we broke the 50,000-mark for the first time since the pandemic, carrying 53,233 passengers on that day. Between now and the end of October, the number of return flights will be progressively increased to about 160 per week, covering 16 airports in 15 cities. This includes four return flights per day to Beijing, six return flights per day to Shanghai Pudong airport and nine return flights per week to Shanghai Hongqiao airport.