São Paulo – Dubai International Airport received 70.4 million passengers last year, a 6.1% increase over the 66.4 million travellers of 2013. According to Dubai Airports, the company that manages the terminal, the airport held its position as one of the busiest in the world when it comes to number of passengers in international flights.
In a press release sent this Tuesday (27) by the company, Ahmed Bin Saeed Al Maktoum, chairman of Dubai Airports, said that the growth is the result of Dubai’s goal of becoming a global center of aviation.
“The shared goal is to make Dubai a global centre of aviation and we are nearing that goal thanks to an open skies policy, a friendly business environment, Dubai’s growing attractiveness as a centre for trade, commerce and tourism, growing network connectivity due to the rapid expansion of Emirates and Flydubai and timely investment in aviation infrastructure”, said the chairman.
The open skies policy is signed by two countries and allows that the flight frequency itself to be determined by passenger demand and not limited to protect companies from one country or the other. According to data from Dubai Airports, in December only, 6.49 million passengers went through Dubai Airport, an increase of 7.5% over the same period in 2013.
Aircraft movements, a calculation that includes takeoffs and landings, rose 4% in December, but dropped 3.4% in the year because one of the runways was closed for 80 days for refurbishment. In the year, there were 357,339 between takeoffs and landings. The number of passengers per flight increased 5.1% to an average of 208.3 passengers in each flight.
Another reason for aircraft movement reduction was the shift of freight flights to another airport, Dubai World Central, in Jebel Ali. This also reduced the volume of cargo handled in the Dubai International Airport. The cargo volume (loaded and unloaded) last year stood at 2.3 million tons. In the previous year, the figure was 2.4 million tons.
Departures and destinations
The regions with the biggest growth in passenger flow with the Dubai International Airport were Western Europe, with 1.1 million more passengers than 2013, the Indian Subcontinent, with an increase of 936.400 tourists, Asia (716,100) and North America (432,500). Dubai Airports’ CEO, Paul Griffiths, said that this year’s goal is to receive 79 million passengers. In 2015, more flights to new destinations will be launched.
Still according to Dubai Airports, Dubai International Airport is connected to 270 cities and host 140 airlines. India is the main destination of those that boarding in the terminal. In total, 8.9 million people went to India from the airport last year. United Kingdom, Saudi Arabia and Pakistan round up the list of main destinations.
The busiest routes, however, were those going to London (2.6 million), Doha, in Qatar (2.3 million), Kuwait (1.9 million), Mumbai, in India (1.9 million), and Jeddah, Saudi Arabia (1.69 million).
*Translated by Sérgio Kakitani
