HONG KONG - HONG KONG airport operator on Sunday warned of tough time ahead for the aviation industry amid global financial turmoil as air traffic at the city's international airport continued to fall in September.

'Given the very difficult operating environment and shrinking demand in the economic slowdown, airlines are expected to further scale back their operation or put on hold their expansion plans,' Stanley Hui, chief executive officer of Airport Authority, said in a statement.

'The aviation industry is expected to face even more difficult times in the coming months.'

Hong Kong International Airport handled 3.6 million passengers and 317,000 tonnes of cargo last month, a decline of a respective 4.7 per cent and 7.5 per cent from the same month a year ago. The US and Europe, China's biggest trading partners, saw a sharp drop in air cargo traffic to and from Hong Kong.

The number of international passenger, cargo and non-revenue flights eased 0.4 per cent to 24,570 in September.

'The steep decline in the traffic volumes in both passenger and air cargo clearly reflected a very troubled global economy as a result of the financial tsunami,' Mr Hui added.

Separately HSBC's Asia chief in Hong Kong painted a similarly bleak picture.

'The impact is going to come more severely to Hong Kong and is going to be a slowdown. You can see it happening now,' HSBC Asia chief executive officer Sandy Flockhart told reporters.

'But exactly how it impacts and for how long is something that is not yet absolutely certain. But it is probably going to be longer than perhaps people think,' Ms Flockhart warned. -- THOMSON REUTERS