Manchester Airport celebrates double-digit annual passenger growth

Manchester Airport has announced a double-digit hike in its annual passenger numbers.

The UK’s third-busiest airport added 2.7m passengers during the last 12 months, representing growth of 11.4%.

March saw 1.9m passengers pass through the airport’s three terminals, up year on year by 10.1% despite the late Easter.

Manchester Airport, which has seen three years of consecutive growth, is now ranked as Europe’s second-fastest growing large airport behind only Moscow Sheremetyevo.

The site’s bosses said growth has been achieved across the board, with 1.1m extra passengers flown to Spain alone in the last year.

After Spain, the next biggest short-haul growth was France, with passenger figures up 261k, followed by Germany (up 228k) and Italy (198k).

Long-haul traffic was also up, with the number of passengers carried to the United States more than doubling as new routes to Los Angeles, Houston and Boston were launched.

The year was rounded off with Virgin Atlantic introducing the UK’s first direct service outside London to San Francisco. Thomas Cook Airlines will also start operating the route from next month.

Elsewhere in Manchester Airport’s long-haul offer, strong growth was seen in services to Pakistan (up 112k) and China (77k). The latter was boosted by the launch of Hainan Airlines’ direct route to Beijing.

Manchester Airport CEO Ken O’Toole said: “March rounded off a strong year of growth at Manchester, meaning we are now one of the fastest growing airports not just in the UK, but in Europe as a whole.

“It was particularly pleasing to end the month with the launch of our San Francisco service, which is a route we have long coveted and one that business and leisure passengers have been calling for some time.”

He continued: “It was the latest in a long list of key long-haul routes we have added over the past 12 months, ensuring we are connecting the North with key markets across the world.

“That is on top of extremely strong growth in flights to short haul locations, meaning Manchester has one of the most varied route networks in the world.”

Aircraft movements were up last month by 11% as more than 15k planes took off and landed on the airport’s two runways

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