Muscat: Muscat International Airport witnessed an increase of 4.7 percent in the number of international and domestic passengers in the first nine months of this year.
A total of 9,764, 530 passengers traveled through the Muscat airport from 73,137 flights (an increase of 3.4 percent). These included 16,826 transit passengers
A total of 1, 230, 326 passengers travelled through the Salalah airport from 8,374 flights (an increase of 6.8 percent).
It may be noted that Sohar Airport received 62,842 passengers from 544 flights during the same period while Duqm Airport in Al Wusta received 44,753 passengers from 233 flights during the same period.
Muscat International Airport handled over 7.5 million passengers in the first seven months of this year.
It may be noted that the Sultanate of Oman received over two million visitors in the first half of this year.
In August 2024, Middle Eastern carriers saw a 4.9 percent year-on-year increase in demand. Capacity increased 5.6% year-on-year and the load factor was 82.5%, compared to the previous year.
“Looking ahead, the continued strong demand growth signals that we could be fast approaching an infrastructure capacity crunch that would restrict connectivity and choice for passengers and businesses. If governments want to maximize the benefits of aviation, they must make bold decisions to ensure sufficient infrastructure capacity. And, in the interim, both airports and air navigation service providers need to do more with the resources they currently have. In particular, the variance in the declared capacity of airports with broadly the same infrastructure needs to be resolved, with airports emulating the best performers. The industry cannot afford to under-utilize the airport infrastructure that we have,” said Willie Walsh, IATA’s Director General.
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