Norwegian Air carried 2 million passengers in August, compared to 790,000 passengers in the same month last year. Finnish airline Finnair carried 880,500 passengers, a 230 percent increase from August last year.
Norwegians CEO Geir Karlsen states in a comment that the company's booking situation for the fall is encouraging and that business travelers are on their way back.
Norwegian's total passenger traffic (RPK) increased by 186 percent to 2.6 million seat kilometers while capacity (ASK) was 3 million seat kilometers, an increase of 132 percent. Unit revenue (RASK) reached 0.57, an increase of 49 percent from 0.38.
Finnair writes that the number of passengers in August was lower than in the peak summer month of July, corresponding to a drop of 11.9 percent. The effects of Covid-19, including strict travel restrictions imposed in many countries, continued to affect passenger traffic figures, the company writes, pointing out that this was particularly noticeable in Asia.
In addition, Russian airspace closed at the end of February, as a result of sanctions related to the war in Ukraine, which resulted in the cancellation of routes in Asian traffic, Finnair writes.
ASK, a measure of capacity, increased by just over 150 percent in August for Finnair, but was 3.4 percent lower compared to July. Capacity utilization, measured as the passenger load factor, increased by 35.7 percentage points compared to last year but fell by 8.8 percentage points compared to July to 77.8 percent.
