SINGAPORE, Nov 19 — Changi Airport logged a third straight month of growth in October, largely because low-cost carriers are doing well.
A total of 3.32 million passengers passed through its gates, 6 per cent more than that in October last year.
Passenger traffic was also up 6 per cent in September, compared with the same month last year, while growth between August this year and the same month last year was 0.5 per cent.
These increases follow nine straight months of falls in passenger numbers.
Cargo traffic also grew for the first time in 13 months: A total of 154,000 tonnes were handled last month, a 2 per cent rise from that of a year earlier.
Overall, the number of flights hit an all-time high last month — 20,985, which was 6.7 per cent higher than that in October last year.
Low-cost carriers AirAsia, Jetstar Asia and Tiger Airways buoyed this figure, accounting for about one in five flights — a spike from 2004, when just one in every 20 flights in and out of the airport were budget flights.
When the global economic downturn took hold late last year, a slump in general demand for air travel boosted business for the low-cost carriers as travellers sought out cheaper options.
Even as premium players like Singapore Airlines (SIA) and Qantas cut back on the number of flights to fill their planes, AirAsia, Jetstar Asia and Tiger Airways added flights and started new routes.
The rapid opening up of Singapore-Malaysia air routes in the last two years has also been key to the jump in the number of low-cost flights out of Changi.
Just last month, for example, the two sides announced the opening of air links between Singapore and six Malaysian destinations, including beach and dive getaways Labuan and Sibu.
More flights have also been allowed between Singapore and 10 current Malaysian destinations, including Ipoh, Langkawi, Malacca and Kuantan.
All these have been good for Changi Airport, which, as at the end of last month, was served by 85 airlines linking Singapore to 200 cities in 60 countries.
Never before has the airport had this many city links, and the number looks set to grow. Jetstar, for example, will launch new flights to Macau, Phuket, Haikou and Manila next month.
SIA, Changi's biggest airline partner, is seeing an uptick in the sale of seats. It said this week that it filled more than 80 per cent of them across its network last month.
It still carried 9.6 per cent fewer passengers last month compared with a year earlier, but this was already a big improvement from the 24 per cent plunge year-on-year in May. That was the carrier's biggest plunge in traffic numbers since the crisis hit.
SIA's chief executive Chew Choon Seng is upbeat, given that big events like the Singapore Airshow and the opening of the integrated resorts are coming up in the next few months.
And if SIA fares well, so will Changi, since the airline accounts for about half of the airport's total passenger traffic. — The Straits Times
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