The health crisis is seriously impacting the air transport sector. Airlines are trying to turn up the face, but this is not obvious with the reservation rate that is made with carriers. What will be the next step? IATA, the International Air Transport Association, is quite pessimistic after the end of the summer season, and estimates for the year as a whole results below 66% of 2019 traffic.
The month of August is even more deplorable than that of July when the results showed a considerable drop (the airports of France recorded a drop in attendance, which is notably between 50% and almost 80% during the month of July) … According to IATA, passenger traffic is down, with revenue passenger kilometers (RPK) down 75.3% from the same month last year. Following the gradual recovery of carriers, domestic markets are rising slightly compared to international markets. Capacity in August was down 63.8% year-on-year, and the load factor fell 27.2 percentage points to 58.5%.
The return of government restrictions linked to the Covid-19 pandemic led to the stopping of the resumption of flights in mid-August. The season remains disastrous, with notably a virtually non-existent recovery … which leads to predictions of a 66% drop by IATA.
A slight improvement was recorded in domestic traffic, with a decrease of 50.9% compared to the same period of the previous year after 56.9% recorded in July. Indoor capacity fell 34.5%, and the load factor fell 21.5 percentage points to 64.2%.
On the international side, the decrease is 88.3% compared to August 2019, after 91.8% recorded in July. Capacity fell 79.5% and the load factor fell 37.0 percentage points to 48.7%.
• Europe
Capacity fell 68.7% and the load factor fell 32.1 percentage points to 57.1%, the highest rate among all regions.
• Africa
Capacity fell 78.4% and the load factor fell 41.0 percentage points to 34.6%.
• Middle East
Capacity fell 81.9% and load factor fell 47.1 percentage points to 35.3%.
• North America
Capacity fell 82.6% and load factor fell 49.9 percentage points to 38.5%.
• Latin America
Capacity fell 90.1% and load factor fell 27.8 percentage points to 56.1%, the second highest rate among regions.
• Asia Pacific
Capacity fell 90.4% and load factor fell 48.0 percentage points to 34.8%.
airlines are already imagining the future … by implementing a restructuring plan with job cuts, the withdrawal of older aircraft, reduction in networks … the crisis that the whole world is experiencing will modify the airline sector. ‘aviation.
It is imperative to maintain government assistance and open the borders to allow air transport to recover a bit. The summer season saw very low revenues, which does not improve the situation for airlines. According to IATA, hundreds of thousands of airline jobs will be lost … and it will affect jobs across the aviation industry as well. It is necessary to implement an internationally recognized screening regime for COVID-19 that will precede flights, in order to restore the confidence of governments enough to open borders and revive air operations.