Traffic through Malta International Airport continued on its upward trend, with passenger movements reaching 759,547 in August. Translating into an increase of 9.5 per cent over the same month last year, this total was yet another traffic record for the airport.

The August holiday rush kept the Malta International Airport team busy with an average of 24,502 daily passenger movements.

This rise in passenger traffic was observed in parallel with a 9.7 per cent increase in aircraft movements, with the airfield seeing over 5,000 take-offs and landings during the month.

While seat capacity grew by 10.5 per cent, seat load factor (SLF) dropped by 0.7 percentage points, when compared with the same month last year, to stand at 87.4 per cent.

The top drivers of traffic for August were the United Kingdom (+12.1 per cent), Italy (+16.2 per cent), Germany (-11.0 per cent), France (+2.5 per cent) and Spain (+30.0 per cent).

According to the 2018 Summer Season Travel Report, Malta has been gaining ground with British leisure travellers, featuring among the top 10 fastest-growing destinations for the summer season with a 13.7 per cent growth rate.

Spain’s noteworthy performance can be partly attributed to the fact that Spanish routes increased with the introduction of flights to Bilbao, Malaga, and Seville. The French route network was also widened with the launch of three scheduled services to Paris-Beauvais, Nice, and Lourdes, contributing to the market’s 2.5 per c