Airline News
Mainland traffic up 11.7% and on-time performance improves in September
October 30th 2015
China's civil aviation sector saw steady growth in both passenger and cargo traffic in the first nine months of 2015, according to statistics released by the National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC). Read More » Turnover grew 15% , to 543.2 billion passenger-kilometres in the first three quarters to September 30. Mainland airlines carried 330 million passengers in the period, up 11.7% year-on-year, the authority said. Cargo turnover reached 1.49 billion ton-kilometres, up 10.2% compared with the year-ago period. Cargo and mail traffic amounted to 4.54 million tons, up 5.7% year-on-year.
The Civil Aviation Administration of China (CAAC), for the month of October, withheld new route approvals from Shanghai’s Pudong, Hangzhou’s Xiaoshan and Tianjin’s Binhai as punishment for major flight delays in August. In August, the CAAC barred Shenzhen Bao'An from adding flights after it “mishandled” major delays since the second half of 2014. The suspension became effective August 1 and will last until year-end.
In the interim, China’s on-time performance improved significantly in September. The average on-time departure performance of China's 24 major airports, handling more than ten million passengers annually, stood at 78.16%, up 10.35% year-on-year, and 9.21% higher than in August, according to the latest CAAC data.
Kunming’s Changshui again took the top spot with an on-time departure performance of 89.17%, followed by Xi'an’s Xianyang (86.38%) and Chongqing’s Jiangbei (83.58%). At Beijing’s Capital Airport, 78.11% of departures were on-time. Pudong and Tianjin still ranked at the bottom of the list with only 64.56% and 63.48%, respectively, on-time departures in September.
Mainland airlines averaged 73.87% on-time departure performance in September, up 11.33%% year-on-year, and a 16.76% improvement on August figures. Joy Air earned the top spot with 88.87% of its flights operating as scheduled, followed by Qingdao Airlines and Shandong Airlines with 87.69% and 81.82%, respectively.
