North American aviation begins to recover

(AFP PHOTO CHRISTOPHE SIMON)

The amount of air traffic in North America will increase for the first time in years this month, according to statistics released this week by aviation analyst OAG.

The number of seats available for flying within North America has increased - albeit only by one percent over August 2009 - for the first time since 2007, making it the third largest aviation market in the world, behind Asia Pacific and Europe.

The number of flights taking to the sky has also increased in North America, again by one percent, with 885,078 flights scheduled for the month.

Overall, global capacity is set to show a healthy growth, with six percent more flights taking off this month than a year ago - a total of 2.7 million around the world, and 148,868 more than August 2009.

Africa posted particularly impressive growth, with the number of flights to and from the region up 13 percent, with 5,033 flights more than last year.

Asia also continued its growth trend, seeing an additional 5,385 flights to and from the region (nine percent more), as did the Middle East, with 5,026 (ten percent) more flights.

The most notable hotspot this month was Madrid, which showed a 17 percent growth in number of flights to North America and 41 percent growth in the number of seats available to Asia Pacific.

Rome, Frankfurt and Amsterdam also showed considerable growth, said OAG, as did Shanghai, Beijing and Hong Kong.

http://www.oagaviation.com