Dubai International announced that it had a robust start of the New Year. Dubai airports kicked off 2014 with yet another passenger traffic record. The facilities are estimated to have served more than 6.4 million passengers in January only.
This is the first time Dubai International has recorded such high passenger traffic. In comparison, last January the airport served a little over 5.5 million. This is nearly jump with nearly 1 million or over 15% for just one year.
According to the latest traffic report published by Dubai International, the record-breaking amount of passengers was a result of the traditionally busy New Year season. In addition, the Dubai Shopping Festival, which also took place in January, has certainly contributed to the high traffic.
Most impressive was the passenger traffic growth from within the Arab Gulf Cooperation Council (AGCC). The number of these regional passengers increased with more than 180,000. Particularly high was the traffic from Jeddah, Doha and Riyadh. The number of passengers from Western Europe also increased greatly. Only in January, their number rose by nearly 141,000. Passenger traffic from the Indian Subcontinent increased by over 126,000 people.
Like just in the last few months, the fastest-expanding market in the first month of 2014 was that of Eastern Europe. It saw a rise of more than 42%. Next was Australia with an increase of nearly 27%, followed by Asia with almost 21%.
The report also informs that the most popular destination was India’s Mumbai. In addition, India, in general, was again the busiest destination country. Dubai International recorded traffic of more than 800,000 passengers to this destination only. Second busiest was Saudi Arabia with passenger traffic of more than 514,000 travellers. UK was also in the top three this January with nearly 436,000 passengers.
Also, the volume of freight served by Dubai International has also increased. While in January 2013, the airport served more than 188.500 tonnes of freight, in January 2014 they amounted to over 197,000 tonnes. It is estimated that this is a 4.5% rise. There was also a 4.1% increase in the number of aircraft movements. As result, they reached more than 32,600 during the first month of the year.
