Finnair 2004 passenger numbers reach record heights

Last year, Finnair's passenger numbers passed the eight million mark for the first time in the airline's history. Finnair Group airlines flew a total of 8,149,100 passengers in 2004, which is 1.3 million passengers (19%) more than in 2003. Demand (RPK) in 2004 was 20.2% higher than the previous year. At the same time, capacity was increased by 17.4% which led to the passenger load factor improving by 2.4 percentage points to 71.2 per cent.

Finnair traffic, measured in passenger kilometers, increased by 15.1% in December, while capacity was up by 17.6%, resulting in a passenger load factor of 72.8%, 1.6 points lower than last year. Finnair Group airlines altogether transported 636,100 passengers, which is 17.2% more than a year ago.

Finnair scheduled traffic increased by 14.3% compared to December last year. Passenger load factor was 64.6%, down 1.6 percentage points. The number of passengers carried was 528,700, up 17.3%.

Departure punctuality of scheduled flights was 84.5% (based on a fifteen minute standard), 2.4 points better than in December 2003. Leisure flights included, departure punctuality was 82.8% (+1.8 p.p). Arrival punctuality of scheduled flights was 85.3% and that of all operations was 84.5%.

Finnair's Tallinn-based subsidiary Aero, carried 49,900 passengers on routes between Helsinki and the Baltic capitals and within Southern Finland. The total number of passengers for the year was 213,100. During December, Stockholm-based flynordic (former Nordic Airlink) continued to gain market share and carried 74,600 passengers on its Scandinavian routes. flynordic's performance meters have been geared to Finnair standards during 2004. flynordic's amended total passenger figure for 2004 is 725,000. In future reporting, amended numbers from 2004 will be used as comparison figures. Aero and flynordic figures respectively are included in the Finnair Group total figures.

Scheduled traffic

In scheduled traffic (international + domestic) revenue passenger kilometres increased by 14.3%. The change in capacity was +17.1%. Passenger load factor was 64.6%, 1.6 percentage points lower than last year.

In scheduled international traffic, total number of passengers was up by 32.7%, partly affected by adding flynordic figures. Capacity in ASKs was +20.6%, while RPKs increased by 16.8%.

In European scheduled traffic, ASKs increased by 16.7%, and as RPKs increased by 16.6%, the passenger load factor was 56.9%, down 0.1 points from previous year.

In North Atlantic scheduled traffic, capacity increased by 30.6% due to added frequencies to JFK and MIA. Change in RPKs was +9.8%, and passenger load factor for December was 69.1%, 13.1 points lower than previous year.

In Asian scheduled traffic, capacity increase was 22.7% mainly due to adding frequencies to Shanghai and Osaka since beginning of June. The passenger traffic was up by 19.0%. Passenger load factor was 75.9%, 2.4 percentage points down.

Domestic scheduled traffic decreased by 2.6% on a capacity decrease of 2.3%. Passenger load factor declined by 0.2 percentage points to 55.4%.

Leisure traffic

ASKs for leisure traffic increased in December by 18.6%, and RPKs increased by 16.3%, resulting in a passenger load factor of 90.3%, 1.7 points lower than last year.

Cargo

Cargo traffic increased by 16.2% in terms of cargo tonnes carried. Growth in scheduled traffic was +10.5%. Increase in Asian traffic was 11.2%. Volume in European traffic increased by 2.0%. In North-Atlantic traffic cargo volume increased by 47.8%. Cargo traffic carried on chartered cargo flights increased by 61.9%. The cargo load factor was 59.4%. The cargo load factor in the Far Eastern traffic was 78.6% and in the North Atlantic traffic 73.9%.

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