Dubai International Airport welcomes 0.1% fewer passengers in April

Passenger traffic at Dubai International Airport declined 0.1 per cent year-on-year in April to 7.6 million.

The slight decrease came after the airport, the world’s busiest for international passenger traffic, received just 1.1 per cent more passengers in the first quarter after traffic declined in January and February.

Read: Dubai International Airport sees just 1.1% passenger growth in Q1

Year-to-date traffic to April was up 0.8 per cent from 30.11 million to30.35million

Eastern Europe was the fast growing market in April, growing 28 per cent, while India remained the top destination country with 1.027 million passengers.

Saudi Arabia was second with 556,640 and the UK was third with 530,404.

Flight movements during the month were down 3 per cent to 34,244. Similarly for the year-to-date flight movements were down 3 per cent to 140,613.

However, the average number of passenger per movement increased 2.2 per cent during April from 225 in the same month last year to 230.

Cargo volumes were down 0.7 per cent year-on-year to 217,881 tonnes and 2.6 per cent in the first four months of 2018 to 832,187 tonnes.

The emirate’s aviation hub saw 5.5 per cent passenger growth in 2017 to 88.2 million, the lowest increase in nine years.

Dubai Airports expects passenger traffic to grow 2.4 percent this year to 90.3 million.

CEO Paul Griffiths has predicted it could then return to double-digit passenger growth as early as 2019 helped by a partnership between home airlines Emirates and Flydubai.

Read: Dubai airport predicts rise in traffic after 2017 growth dips

However, a 45-day runway closure next year for repair and upgrade work will limit traffic in the April-May period.

Read: Dubai International Airport’s southern runway to close for 45 days in 2019