Air NZ October load factor rises 74.5 percent

By NZPA

Friday 6th December 2002

Air New Zealand said today its total passenger load factor was 74.5 percent in October, up 11.4 percentage points on the same month a year earlier.

Group revenue passenger kilometres (RPK) -- the total number of passengers carried multiplied by the number of kilometres flown -- increased by 13.9 percent for the month.

Available seat kilometres (ASK) -- the number of seats available for sale times the distance flown -- fell by 3.6 percent.

For the four months to October 2002, ASKs decreased by 6.7 percent while RPKs increased by 0.9 percent compared with October 2001.

Passenger load factor for the four months of 75.3 percent was 5.6 percentage points higher than the previous year.

On the domestic front, ASKs fell by 13.2 percent in October, due largely to the withdrawal of Air NZ's budget subsidiary Freedom Air from the domestic market.

Domestic traffic, as measured by RPKs, fell by 8.1 percent, giving a passenger load factor of 69 percent -- 3.8 percentage points higher than in October 2001 as capacity reductions exceeded the fall in passenger traffic.

For the four months to October 2002, domestic traffic and capacity decreased by 4.9 percent and 6.9 percent respectively, resulting in a passenger load factor of 68.0 percent, up 1.4 percentage points.

International traffic for the month of October increased by 17.2 percent. Last year international travel took a big hit in October following the September 11 attacks in the United States.

For the four months to October 2002, international traffic increased 1.7 percent on capacity reductions of 6.7 percent.

Comments from our readers

No comments yet