Not a good period for aviation sector; Dublin airport reports 70% drop in September flights

Latest figures show a two-third decrease in the flight travel in Ireland. It is the Covid-19 restrictions that is preventing the flights from takeoff.

On Monday, the Irish Aviation Authority (IAA) said that there has been an unprecedented fall in flights over a period of first nine months of the year. IAA says that this fall has taken place because of the pandemic only.

Compared to the same month in the previous year (September 2019), the authorities said that they felt the decrease of 65%. Last month the authorities handled only 38,172 in the Irish air space and airports.

The Republic’s biggest fell in and out of Dublin Airport was recorded in September as there were 6,630 flights, which is 70% decrease.

Cork was down 76 per cent at 477, while traffic at Shannon declined 71 per cent to 557 flights.

Peter Kearney, IAA chief executive said that till September, IAA dealt with 390,893 flights, and in the previous year, it was 901,707 during the same period last year.

He also said that air travel cannot handle these kinds of losses in the short to medium terms.

Mr Kearney said that instead of restricting and reducing air travel, the government should adopt the EU’s traffic light system for safe travel.

“We welcome the Government’s intention to fully sign up to the EU-wide approach,” he said.

“The plan, if applied consistently across Europe and endorsed by governments, is a key stepping stone for the reopening of travel across Europe, particularly important for an island nation such as Ireland.”

The EU traffic lighting system will grade places as green, orange and red according to the rate of Covid-19 spread in each place. Travelling will be smooth for those coming from lower spread areas which are indicated by green and orange.

While anyone from the red zone will be tested thoroughly and according to their results, they will be asked to take treatments or precautions.