As the travel industry looks to revive with the covid-19 graph going down each passing day and the restrictions on air travel ease, the domestic air traffic has seen an increment of 67% as compared to the previous year and about 24% rise in October alone making it up to around 8.8 million passengers. The season of festivities is also being seen as a reason for the surge.
The Recent Travel Rebound
The month of October witnessed around 72,000 registered departures which were 46% higher as compared to the previous year, where 49,150 departures were registered. According to the Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA), a 5.45% of rising was seen in the month of September as compared to the previous month of August. Around 7.07 million passengers took the air route as compared to the 6.7 million previously.
The reports suggest that October witnessed around 2400 departures every day, which was much higher than last year’s October tally of 1,585. It was also considerably higher than the month of September where 2100 flights took off. The average number of passengers per flight also increased from 117 in September 2021 to 122 in October 2021.
It is to be noted that the Indian aviation industry has seen a significant recovery since June of this year after getting devastated by the impacts of Covid-19. Moreover, airlines have been able to operate on 100% capacity as they used to in pre-covid times since October 18. This has given them an opportunity to capitalize on the festival season, which has surged the travel demand in the country.
A Thing of Concern
However, it’s not all rainbow for the airlines in the country as the rising prices of aviation fuel due to the increase in global crude oil demand is becoming a thing of concern for all the airlines. A surge of 94.4% has been seen on Aviation Turbine Fuel (ATF) in the month of November as compared to the same time last year. In addition, the not-so-strong liquidity status of the airlines has already been impacting their credit profiles.
