For the second consecutive year, Dublin Airport has handled more US transatlantic travel than Shannon, according to the latest figures. More than 11 million passengers used Cork, Dublin and Shannon airports during the first nine months of this year, according to figures issued yesterday by Aer Rianta.
The largest increase was at Dublin Airport, where to date more than nine million passengers have passed through, showing an increase of 12 per cent compared with the same period last year.
Cork, at 8 per cent, had the next largest increase, bringing the total number of passengers at the southern airport to just over a million. Shannon, on the other hand, showed a 7 per cent increase in transatlantic figures, despite the change in airport status in favour of Dublin, which increased its US traffic by 22 per cent.
For the second year in succession, Dublin (520,399) handled more terminal US traffic than Shannon (444,731). Although Shannon, with 330,325, had by far the largest number of transit passengers, this was down by 11 per cent, due mainly to the loss of TWA Greek charters and cutbacks by Aeroflot.
The loss of the Russian airline and a decline in French and German charter flights mainly accounted for a drop of 12 per cent in Shannon's European traffic.
The largest growth at Shannon was in UK traffic, which is up by 10 per cent and has been showing a steady increase since 1994. This is mainly due to the introduction of AB Airlines operating into Gatwick, London, as well as Stansted and Birmingham, where the company has a passenger code share arrangement with Aer Lingus.
Aer Rianta is confident that the level of growth will be sustained for the remainder of the year.