Airport operator Fraport has reported that year-to-date cargo throughput rose by 5.3% compared to the first half of 2016, to nearly 1.1m metric tonnes, continuing the growth momentum from the second half of last year.
Passenger numbers at the airport also rose – and for the ninth consecutive month. July saw 6.4m passengers pass through the airport, equating to a 4.4% year-on-year increase. This represented a new monthly traffic record, exceeding the previous record from August 2015 by some 82,000 passengers.
Accumulated maximum take-off weights for July grew 1.4% year-on-year, and exceeded the pre-existing July 2015 record by some 15,000 metric tonnes to 2.8m metric tonnes. Aircraft movements increases by 2.3% to 43,482 take-offs and landings.
The encouraging cargo volumes posted by Fraport coincide with ongoing strong demand in the Eurpoean freight sector. IATA reported that international freight tonne kilometres flown by European airlines increased by 13.6% year-on-year in the first half of 2017, up from 3.4% in the same period of 2016. Air freight in general had its strongest first-half growth in seven years, IATA reported in June, with global FTKs growing by 10.4% year-on-year in the first half of 2017.
