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Cathay Pacific hails "milestone" month of July with 2 million passengers flown
August 19th 2024
Cathay Pacific chief customer and commercial officer, Lavinia Lau, said July was a "milestone" month for the Hong Kong-based airline after reporting more than 2 million passengers in a calendar month for the first time since the COVID-19 pandemic. Read More » The oneworld alliance member flew 2.008 million passengers last month, up 15.1% from 1.744 million in the same month in 2023. "Such robust demand was driven by the increased popularity of long-haul flights to and from Hong Kong in the first half of the month among students and those visiting friends and relatives," Lau said. "This was followed by a surge in demand for travel to popular short-haul destinations in Japan and Southeast Asia in the second half of July. Looking ahead, we expect that the robust travel demand seen in July will continue through August, while September will receive a boost from students returning to the United Kingdom ahead of the new school year." While the passenger load factor fell 3.8 percentage points to 85.5% in July, from 89.3% a year earlier, the figure was the highest so far in 2024. The July passenger numbers were at 61.2% of the 3.279 million Cathay flew prior to the pandemic, in July 2019.
