Number of flights in and out of Britain drops

The number of flights in and out of the United Kingdom has witnessed a drop for the first time since the recession that followed the September 11 terror attacks, as a result of the exorbitant costs of fuel which have forced airlines to reduce services.

The National Air Traffic Service (NATS), the company that manages Britain’s air traffic, said it handled 1,401 fewer flights in July 2008 compared with July 2007.

The British media quoted Ian Hall, director of operations at the National Air Traffic Service, as remarking: “The fall in flights comes during the peak summer season, when the airline industry is supposed to be at its strongest. The aviation industry has always been a barometer of the wider economy so it should not come as any surprise to see a slight slowdown, particularly since the airlines have signalled some cutbacks to services.”

The figures produced by NATS showed that though its two biggest customers – Heathrow Airport and Gatwick Airport – broke monthly records, the overall trend was negative. While the number of trans-Atlantic flights dropped by 457, the number of domestic flights fell by 201. Other flights – including services to Europe, Asia and the Middle East – fell by over 1,200.

Over the past few months, leading airlines of the United Kingdom had announced plans to reduce growth or cut capacity.

British Airways, the national airline of the United Kingdom and the nation’s flag carrier, is cutting the number of seats it is flying in the winter of 2008 by 3%, including the termination of many routes out of Gatwick Airport.

Ryanair, headquartered in Dublin, Ireland, with its biggest operational base at London Stansted Airport, is grounding 20 planes in the winter of 2008. Ryanair is also Europe’s largest budget airline.

EasyJet Airline Company Limited (known as easyJet), the a low-cost airline based at London Luton Airport, has announced that it will cut its expansion plans by half.

Meanwhile, according to the travel information company Official Airline Guide (OAG), global airline capacity will fall by 7% between October and December 2008. Airlines across the world are planning to cut 60 million seats – equivalent to one in 14 – from their services. This would mean greater cuts in flights than what occurred in the aftermath of the September 11 terror attacks.

A report released by the OAG said that Asia, one of the fastest-growing aviation markets, would see a 13% cut in the number of seats flown – which would, in effect, take the Asian aviation market back to where it was 3 years ago.

However, the biggest number of cuts will take place in domestic flights of the United States, which is the world’s biggest airline market.

Worldwide, routes will be cut at 275 airports, the OAG report added.

In 2008, three carriers closed shop. They are: MaxJet Airways, a trans-Atlantic all-business class airline headquartered in Virginia, the United States, Eos Airlines, an American all-business class airline based at John F Kennedy International Airport, and Silverjet, a British all-business class airline based at London Luton Airport.

All these carriers, which offered services between London and New York, could not hold on in the face of the unprecedented rise in the cost of aviation turbine fuel.

Among the airlines that cut services include the US-based American Airlines, which stopped its service from Stansted to New York, and the US-based Continental Airlines, which has been reducing its frequencies.

While Delta Air Lines is planning to drop its Gatwick to New York service in the autumn, British Airways is cutting the frequency of its services to Newark and John F Kennedy International Airport.

Virgin Airlines is planning to do away with one of its daily services to New York.