Inverness Airport recorded its busiest month ever for passenger numbers in July, according to operator Highlands and Islands Airports.
More than 74,500 passengers travelled via the airport in the month, an increase of 5% on the previous year. The success of the airport’s summer 2008 charter flights have contributed to the growth.
Almost 2,000 passengers have flown to Spain this year from Inverness Airport. Thomson, which first introduced charters at Inverness in June 2004, has just completed its most successful ever summer programme from the Highland capital with flights to Spain’s Costa Dorada and Majorca operating at full capacity during June, July and August.
Meanwhile, Airways Holidays’ weekly Jersey flights, introduced in June, have performed well in their first year. A larger aircraft was recently introduced on the route to the popular Channel Islands’ destination and final special offers are now available on Saturday departures until 13 September with the last flight from Jersey arriving back in Inverness on 20 September.
The airport’s other established charter provider, Newmarket Holidays, has also seen strong demand for its Italy and Madeira flights since the end of March and will operate the second part of its 2008 programme to these destinations in September and October.
Swiss company Falcon continued to operate a programme of inbound charters to the Highlands from Zurich over the summer.
Although holiday charters account for a relatively small proportion of the airport’s 700,000 plus passengers per annum, the market is one that Highlands and Islands Airports is keen to grow.
Inglis Lyon, managing director of HIAL said: “Thomson has just completed a very good year at Inverness while Airways and Newmarket continue to have a good season. We have always maintained that there is a good market for charters direct from Inverness because of the convenience to the local population. The results so far this year bear this out and will provide good evidence for us to encourage operators to look at expanding their programmes in 2009.
“Maintaining and developing the airport’s charter programme is a priority for us and is part of providing services that meet the local market’s business and leisure needs,” said Mr Lyon.
Inverness Airport manager James Walton added: “July was our busiest month ever and on some days we were handling throughput that was the equivalent of around 900,000 passengers a year. The scheduled and charter operators have done a good job this summer and the passenger increases on scheduled markets such as London, Birmingham and Manchester should have made a good contribution to the local tourism market over the past months.”
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