Following the 12.7 per cent growth reported for the first half of 2011, passenger movements at Malta International Airport in July increased at a moderate rate of 3.4 per cent reaching a record high for this month of 415,780 passengers.

In July, aircraft movements and seat capacity decreased by 7.5 per cent and 5.1 per cent, respectively, over the corresponding period last year, while the average seat load factor increased by a significant 6.9 percentage points to reach 84 per cent from the 77.1 per cent registered in July 2010.

The maximum take-off weight also decreased by 5.9 per cent on that registered in July last year, while cargo and mail was 10.3 per cent lower than that recorded during the same month in 2010.

Notwithstanding the overall increase in passengers in July, all the core markets, with the exception of Germany and the United Kingdom, registered decreases that month with Italy, Spain and France showing a decrease of 14 per cent, 7.7 per cent and 0.7 per cent, respectively.

The largest market, the United Kingdom saw an increase of 3.8 per cent, the German market of 34.5 per cent, which is equivalent to 15,037 more passenger movements.

The results for the first seven months of the year, in terms of passenger movements, therefore, show an increase of 10.6 per cent when compared to the same period last year, totalling 1.97 million passenger movements.

This increase was mostly due to the increased capacity in the first four months of the year when compared to the same period last year.

For the period January to July, the average seat load factor improved by 4.1 percentage points reaching 73.1 per cent.