Fraport Traffic Figures – December & Full Year 2013: Passenger Traffic Continues to Grow

Fraport AG registered a positive year overall at its Frankfurt Airport (FRA) home base. From January to December 2013, passenger traffic rose by 0.9 percent to about 58.0 million passengers – a new historic yearly record – and cargo tonnage climbed by 1.3 percent to 2.1 million metric tons year-on-year. The reporting month of December 2013 also made a strong contribution to the successful full-year figures: with 4.1 million passengers served (up 2.9 percent) and 178,677 metric tons of cargo handled (up 2.3 percent) at FRA. Fraport AG’s executive board chairman Dr. Stefan Schulte said: “We are pleased to record growth in both our passenger and cargo traffic segments, despite the challenging framework conditions. Although the European aviation industry continues to be in a difficult situation, we are beginning to see early indications of more satisfying growth for 2014. Thus, we expect passenger figures to rise further at Frankfurt Airport.”

Aircraft movements declined by two percent to 472,692 takeoffs and landings compared to last year, due to consolidation measures of the airlines, coupled with higher aircraft capacity utilization, as well as the deployment of larger planes. Thus, the trend towards the decoupling of the traffic volume and aircraft movements continued throughout 2013. FRA, however, closed the last month of the year with 34,769 takeoffs and landings, up one percent compared to December 2012.

For the entire 2013 year accumulated MTOWs (maximum takeoff weights) dropped slightly by 1.7 percent to 28.4 million metric tons year-on-year. In contrast, MTOWs advanced by 1.1 percent to 2.2 million metric tons in December 2013.

Fraport’s international portfolio also developed successfully during 2013. The Group’s majority-owned airports served 103.5 million passengers in total – increasing 4.1 percent year-on-year. Welcoming 14.9 million passengers in 2013, Peru’s Lima Airport (LIM) achieved particularly robust growth of 11.9 percent. With 26.7 million passengers, Antalya Airport (AYT) on the Turkish Riviera also continued its positive development of recent years and posted a 7.1 percent rise. A total of 3.8 million travelers – a gain of 5.5 percent year-on-year – used Varna (VAR) and Burgas (BOJ), Fraport’s two airports on the Bulgarian Black Sea coast. “We are proud to see the growth potential of our international airports further confirmed. For the sixth time and the fifth consecutive year, Lima Airport won the Skytrax “2013 Best Airport in South America” award. The tourism airports of Antalya, Varna and Burgas also feature state-of-the-art terminals and operational facilities, which strengthen them to compete globally and to serve the ongoing growth in air traffic,” said Schulte.