Singapore Airlines September number of passengers up 4.8% to 1.4mn

Yet the airline’s passenger load factor fell 0.7 percentage point to 79.6% during the same month.

In September 2011, Singapore Airlines' system-wide passenger carriage (measured in revenue passenger kilometres) grew 4.7%, on the back of 5.8% growth in capacity (measured in available seat kilometres).

Passenger load factor (PLF) fell 0.7 percentage point to 79.6%. The number of passengers carried rose 4.8% to 1.4 million.

PLFs weakened slightly for most regions except West Asia and Africa, as capacity increases generally outpaced the growth in carriage. The year-on-year improvement in PLF for West Asia and Africa was mainly attributable to stronger loads on the Indian Subcontinent flights, according to an SIA report.

SilkAir’s capacity grew 11.7% year-on-year against a 12.6% increase in system-wide passenger carriage. As a result, PLF increased 0.7 percentage point to 71.7%. The number of passengers carried increased 11.9%.

In September 2011, SilkAir launched thrice-weekly services to Koh Samui in Thailand. PLFs on West Asia routes rose compared to the same month last year on the back of strong regional demand for air travel. Despite growth in passenger carriage, PLFs for East Asia routes declined slightly as the increase in traffic lagged the rate of capacity expansion.

Overall cargo traffic (measured in freight tonne kilometres) saw a year-on-year decline of 2.3% while cargo capacity decreased 2.6%. Consequently, the overall load factor improved by 0.2 percentage point.

Cargo load factor (CLF) remained the same or increased for all regions, except for East Asia and West Asia & Africa.