Positive increase of air traffic in January, but still far from normal

“Air traffic in January has been in line with our forecasts from the autumn. Air traffic levels from December continued into January. It is expected that the rest of the year will also remain below 2019 levels,” says VP Traffic Development, Gaute Skallerud Riise.

“The first quarter of 2022 was marked by Omicron, which explains the huge growth at the start of the year. Although developments have been stable in recent months, aviation remains affected by a difficult world economy and geopolitical situation. It is particularly the number of international passengers that is drawing the total traffic numbers for January down. But although international traffic is generally lower, there are some markets making a positive impact. In Tromsø, the number of international passengers is back at 2019 levels, due to great interest in the northern lights and Arctic experiences from other parts of the world,” Riise concludes

Aircraft movements

There were 53,143 commercial aircraft movements in January 2023. This is an increase of 18 per cent from January 2022. Compared to January 2019, there has been a drop in the number of aircraft movements of 12 per cent.

International traffic

1,138,624 passengers have travelled between Avinor’s airports and international destinations in January. In the same month last year, there were 568,687 international passengers. This means that international traffic has doubled compared to last year when aviation was still impacted by the pandemic and travel restrictions.

Compared to 2019, the decline in international traffic is 20 per cent.

Domestic traffic

There were 2,017,790 passengers on domestic flights in January this year. This is an increase of 59 per cent from January last year.

Compared to January 2019, there has been a decline of 14 per cent.

*Why compare to 2019?

2020 and 2021 were severely affected by travel bans, restrictions and illness. 2019 was the last year without the pandemic or the war in Ukraine, and was a ‘normal year’ in terms of travel.

Definitions in the report

Round trips

Most flights are round trips, regardless of whether they are direct or require a change of aircraft one or more times. When counting round trips, one doesn’t consider any aircraft changes or how many airports one has stopped at on the trip.

Terminal passengers

This method of counting is the same at all airports. Terminal passengers are the number of passengers to and from an airport. All passengers are counted, regardless of whether they are boarding the plane (from land side) at the airport or are arriving by aircraft from another airport. If a passenger arrives by aircraft and travels onward by aircraft, they are counted twice at the airport. Passengers who arrive by aircraft but don’t enter the airport, i.e. wait on the aircraft in transit, are not counted as terminal passengers.