Air passenger demand to grow by two thirds on 2021 levels
Passenger demand in 2022 is expected to grow by two thirds on 2021, only 15 per cent down on 2019 levels.
According to aviation analytics firm Cirium, capacity growth will reach up to 47 per cent and will go back to 2015 levels.
“Whilst I knew Cirium’s fleet forecast is more optimistic than what we did a year ago, we’ve been quite conservative and we still forecast that the world will have lost some three to four years of growth as far into the future as 2038,” said Cirium’s senior consultant Richard Evans.
When working on its forecast for the year, the firm had already taken into account that Covid variants such as Omicron could arise and slow down the pace of recovery.
“We already assumed some slowing down of the pace of recovery this winter – just as we saw in the first quarter of 2021 – before a further rebound in travel going into the summer 2022 season,” Evans added. “So relatively to this baseline, we’re not anticipating reworking our numbers just yet.
“Of course, it’s too early to say exactly what Omicron means to the aviation industry’s recovery. We are in a lot better position this time, with most of Europe, the Americas, and parts of Asia having very high vaccination rates.”
Evans’ comments come on the same day low-cost giant Ryanair said it was expecting its losses for the year ending March to double as a result of Omicron concerns.
The airline said its net losses will range between €250m to €450m, compared with €100-€200m that was previously estimated, Morning Wire reported.