Europe July air traffic above expectations: Eurocontrol

Air traffic in European airspace exceeded air safety organisation Eurocontrol's "optimistic" predictions in July, as demand takes off this summer.

Eurocontrol data show that flights reached 65pc of 2019 levels last month, compared with May flight traffic trailing pre-Covid levels by 61pc.

The July numbers are slightly up on Eurocontrol's predictions made in early summer, when it proposed three scenarios. The most optimistic option planned for widespread vaccination take-up, easing travel restrictions and resumption of long-haul flights. Eurocontrol predicted that flight numbers would reach 64pc of pre-pandemic July levels should these conditions be met. Its baseline forecast was 52pc, and its worst-case scenario saw July flight traffic reach just 46pc of July 2019 levels.

In order to exceed the organisation's optimistic scenario for August, flights would need to be at 69pc of 2019 levels. This looks likely to be met, if not surpassed, as flight traffic reached 68.3pc of pre-Covid levels in the last week of July, at 23,899 per day. Ireland's low-cost Ryanair was the busiest of the main European air carriers, with an average of 2,175 flights per day in July.

The International Air Transport Association (Iata) last week bemoaned the slow start to air travel recovery in June, and its director general Willie Walsh expressed concerns that the chance of a significant revival in international air traffic this summer is growing "fainter" by the day.

By Bea O'Kelly