The Latin American and Caribbean Air Transport Association (ALTA) announced today that Latin America and Caribbean airlines carried 22.8 million passengers in October, and up 9% – or 1,884,258 more passengers – from the previous year. Traffic (RPK) grew 7.8% and capacity (ASK) increased 11.9%, bringing up the load factor to 82.6%, 3.1 percentage points lower than in October 2017. (see table 1).
Traffic to/from Latin America & Caribbean
Latin America and Caribbean airlines carried 2.2 million passengers to and from Latin America and the Caribbean in October, up 17.2% from the previous year (see table 2). Traffic (RPK) grew 3.3% and capacity (ASK) increased 15.2%, bringing the load factor to 81.2%.
Luis Felipe de Oliveira, Executive Director of ALTA, said: «The highest passenger growth was recorded in the international market to/from Latin America with growth exceeding 17%. Between Colombia and the United States 33% more flights were recorded compared to October 2017 and between El Salvador and the United States, the increase was 34%. In the market to/from Europe, traffic between Brazil and Spain grew by 34%, mobilizing a total of 38,000 passengers in October».
To/From Latin America & Caribbean Traffic Distribution
With a 13% accumulated growth in the domestic market and 4% in the international market, Argentina has been one of the aviation markets with the best performance in the region during this year. Since 2015, the international passenger market has grown by 30% and the domestic market 39%.
«Two new low-cost carriers and a mainline carrier have begun domestic operations in the country, while domestic connectivity has improved. In 2015, there were 26 routes between cities that did not need a connection in Buenos Aires and in 2018 this number reached 57 routes» concluded de Oliveira.
