A third of the seats available on Air Malta's flights stayed empty in the first six months of the year, according to figures released by the Association of European Airlines.
Suffering from the worldwide recession, the national airline saw the number of its passengers drop by 7.2 per cent between January and June when compared to the same period last year. The airline carried 648,000 passengers when it had a total capacity of more than one million seats.
Cargo carried by the airline was also significantly down, by 15.4 per cent in the same period, reflecting the substantial drop in exports Maltese companies experienced during the first half of this year.
The situation may be tough for Air Malta but it is not among the worst performing airlines in Europe - AEA members, which include 33 European airlines, saw an average drop in passengers that was higher.
On average, AEA reported a drop of nine per cent in the period under review, with passengers on intra-European flights, Air Malta's main market, decreasing by 6.5 per cent.
Some very established airlines reported significantly low business. Brussels Airlines, Belgium's main carrier, registered a 15.2 per cent drop in passengers, while those on Spanish carrier Iberia decreased by 13.5 per cent. Austrian Airlines announced a drop of 12.1 per cent.
Other major airlines are flying in the same turbulent skies as Air Malta. Germany's Lufthansa reported a drop of 6.4 per cent while Air France had 6.7 per cent fewer passengers when compared to the first six months of 2008. British Airways registered a decline of 5.7 per cent.
At the same time, the AEA noted that the worst hit airlines were those which currently flew to the Far East, where outgoing traffic from Europe dropped significantly.
While intra-European traffic was down 6.5 per cent and the North Atlantic was at minus seven per cent, the hardest-hit market was between Europe and the Far East. At -10.7 per cent, this was the first double-digit traffic loss in this region since the Sars (severe acute respiratory syndrome) epidemic of 2003, the AEA said.
However, according to the AEA, an optimistic silver lining was appearing on the horizon.
"AEA's preliminary figures for July, based on weekly reports, open a new panorama. The negatives are still very much in evidence, but on a reduced scale, with an indication for the month of -2.2 per cent," the association said.