Air traffic statistics just published by airport group Finavia show the effect of the coronavirus pandemic on air traffic and airport operations. In total, the number of air passengers for all Finavia airports fell by 20.1% in January–March. In March, Helsinki Airport’s passenger numbers were down 57.2% compared to the same period the previous year.
“The coronavirus pandemic has made itself felt in many ways at Finavia’s airports. All of us operating at airports have been worried about the safety of passengers. The epidemic, which became a worldwide pandemic outbreak in only a few weeks, has affected the entire industry in very significant and far-reaching ways. The situation has also had an effect on airlines and companies that operate at airports as well as jobs and investments.
According to the current estimate, the impact of the decrease in air traffic on Finavia’s turnover will be over EUR 100 million. We estimate that this year’s total number of passengers may be a third lower than last year.
This is a much more dramatic drop than what air traffic has ever experienced before.
In order to overcome this challenging situation together with the airport community, we have provided our tenants and partners with significant relief. We have also decided to continue the ongoing Helsinki Airport Development Programme for the time being in order to guarantee Finland’s accessibility and competitiveness also in the future,” said Kimmo Mäki, chief executive of Finavia.
In January 2020, the number of passengers was still growing moderately, following the trend from the previous year. 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 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.
On a normal day, an average of 57,000 passengers would pass through Helsinki Airport. At the moment, the airport serves only a little over 1,000 passengers per day, and the number keeps falling.