The Ministry of Transport, Mobility and Urban Agenda (Mitma), through ENAIRE, which is responsible for the supervision of air navigation at the national level, reached a milestone in the history of Spanish aviation by carrying out 223,107 exceptional flight operations within July 2023.
In a statement released on August 8, the Spanish government said this achievement was driven by an impressive daily average of 7,197 flights.
“July is a historic month for aviation in our country. The importance of some figures confirms the indisputable role of Spain as a lever of a key sector for tourism (around 12 per cent of GDP) and the creation of employment and wealth,” the Minister for Transport, Mobility, and the Urban Agenda, Raquel Sánchez pointed out in this regard.
In July of this year, ENAIRE handled a 1.1 per cent more flight operations than in 2019. However, the European average experienced a decline of 6.8 per cent during the same period.
According to the government, Saturday, July 22, was a groundbreaking historical moment for ENAIRE as it managed a total of 449 flights, marking a new peak in its operational history. This feat surpassed the previous record set in July 2019, which saw 7,425 flights handled in a single day.
In addition, delays attributable to ENAIRE have shown a significant decrease of 43 per cent compared to the same period in 2019.
During the first seven months of this year, the national air navigation authority has managed 1,236,835 flights, which is an increase of 12.7 per cent compared to the same period last year.
Such data also show that international flights experienced a notable increase of 10.6 per cent, reaching 694,781. Meanwhile, domestic flights also saw growth, with 254,970 flights, thus marking an increase of 8.9 per cent.
Overflights, which include flights that do not originate or end at a Spanish airport, showed the a growth of 21.9 per cent, reaching 287,084 flights.
Moreover, during these initial seven months, the air traffic control centres that saw an increase in the volume of flights are as follows:
- Seville 279,650 flights, up 16.8 per cent
- Barcelona 579,315, 13.1 per cent
- Madrid 678,907, 12.6 per cent
- Canarias 214,870, 10.2 per cent
- Palma 198,657, 3.8 per cent
In comparison with the data from January to July 2023 with the same period of 2019, Spain has had an increase of 12.7 per cent in the number of flights.
Previous data from the International Air Transport Association (IATA) also revealed that as for international air traffic, there was a significant 31 per cent surge in total during June 2023 in comparison to the same month of the previous year.
It has also been reported that on a worldwide basis, air traffic has now achieved a remarkable 94.2 per cent of the pre-COVID-19 pandemic levels. At the same time, the first half of 2023 witnessed an impressive 47.2 per cent upswing in overall air traffic in comparison with last year’s figures.
