aTP- Arab tourism portal- Abu Dhabi Airports has reported a 9.5 per cent increase in passenger traffic during the first quarter (Q1) of 2016 at the Abu Dhabi International Airport (AUH), compared to the same period last year.Between January and March this year, 6,044,025 passengers travelled through the airport, compared with 5,521,110 during the same period last year.
Aircraft movements rose to 42,204, representing 1.5 per cent growth on the 41,585 movements recorded in Q1 2015.Eng Ahmad Al Haddabi, chief operations officer at Abu Dhabi Airports, said: “Abu Dhabi is an important global transportation hub and this is reflected by the fact that more than six million passengers travelled through Abu Dhabi International Airport during the first quarter of the year.
Traffic rose over the first three months of 2016 between the UK, Thailand, the US and several other countries. With the launch of the Smart Travel initiative last month that allows passengers to check in and move through immigration and security interacting only with cutting edge technology, we are ensuring that the growing number of passengers using Abu Dhabi International Airport spend less time in queues and more time enjoying our airport’s world-class facilities.
”The top 5 destinations for Q1 were: Bangkok, London Heathrow, Jeddah, Doha and Delhi.India continued to top the charts in terms of country routes, with the highest passenger traffic figures of 1,082,527, up 26.9 per cent when compared to Q1 of 2015.
Italy saw a huge increase in traffic with figures up 62.3 per cent on the same period last year, making it the 10th busiest country route in Q1 of 2016.The number of passengers traveling through the airport in March 2016 jumped to over two million passengers, reaching 2,025,842, up 5.6 per cent from 1,917,939 in March 2015.
