Changi Airport hits 50% of pre-Covid-19 passenger numbers

Traffic is returning to Changi Airport faster than expected and has already touched 50 per cent of pre-pandemic levels for the first time since the recovery kicked in.

Earlier this year, the authorities set Changi the target of ramping up its passenger numbers to half of pre-Covid-19 levels by the year end. Instead, it crossed the milestone last month, when 2.9 million passengers arrived, departed or transferred through its gates.

In comparison, 5.8 million passengers had passed through Changi in June 2019.

A total of 18,400 flights also took off or landed at the airport, 58.6 per cent of the 31,391 flights in June 2019, according to figures released by Changi Airport Group (CAG) yesterday.

Observers said the second half of the year should be even better for Changi Airport, with more people travelling and airlines, including national carrier Singapore Airlines (SIA), ramping up capacity.

The knock-on impact will also benefit the larger tourism sector and the overall economy, even if East Asian markets remain a drag on recovery, they added.

Independent analyst Brendan Sobie of Sobie Aviation said: "Fifty per cent was always a conservative estimate for the end of the year. We will continue to see a bit of growth every month."

Changi Airport's showing in June came on the back of a strong second quarter, with total passenger traffic at 43.6 per cent of pre-Covid-19 levels - 14 times the number recorded in the same period last year.

This was mainly due to the holiday season and the reopening of many regional countries from April.

CAG said its rebound is driven by passenger traffic to and from the Americas, which is already 7 per cent higher than in 2019 after additional flights to Canada were added last December.

Connections to regions outside East Asia, including Europe, Oceania and South Asia, also crossed 60 per cent of pre-pandemic levels this quarter, with 85 airlines now flying from Changi to 130 cities worldwide.

The good news reinforces the rebound of the aviation sector here, with SIA two weeks ago reporting that its flights are almost as fully booked as they were pre-pandemic. SIA's June load factor, a measure of the number of seats filled per plane, was 85.5 per cent - comparable to the 86.2 per cent load factor in June 2019.

According to data from aviation intelligence firm Cirium seen by The Straits Times, Asia's airlines are now operating at capacities similar to or even more than those in Europe.

SIA flew 18,606 flights in the second quarter of this year.

This is 80 per cent of the 22,948 flights it flew in the same period in 2019, surpassing British Airways' 71 per cent and German airline Lufthansa's 80 per cent.

Cirium analyst Simin Ngai said this is partially due to severe disruptions at airports in Europe, which have led to flight cancellations for airlines based there.

Mr Sobie said SIA has also been able to bounce back quickly because it had continued to operate many of its flights during the pandemic despite low traffic.

Airports in regions that reopened earlier are still ahead of the curve. Hamad International Airport in Qatar and Dubai International Airport in the United Arab Emirates are almost fully functioning, while Britain's Heathrow Airport is at 83 per cent of pre-pandemic capacity and Australia's Sydney Airport is at 88 per cent.

Asia is the slowest region globally to open up and passenger traffic is still at 22 per cent of pre-Covid-19 levels, though this should rapidly increase to over 70 per cent by the year end.

Mr Lim Ching Kiat, CAG's managing director for air hub development, said: "The reopening of Terminal 4 and partial opening of Terminal 2 will give us the capacity to support our airline partners' efforts in restarting services and launching new routes."