SIA passenger capacity recovers to 44% of pre-Covid levels

Meanwhile, group passenger load for the year dipped by 0.9 points.

The clouds cleared as Singapore Airlines (SIA) reported an increase of 2 percentage points MoM to 44% of pre-Covid-19 levels for the month of February. 

Group passenger load factor, meanwhile, dipped by 0.9 percentage points m-o-m to 39.1%, or a 29.4 percentage point addition on a YoY basis.

Ticket sales for Vaccinated Travel Lane (VTL) services saw the 50% cap in arrival quotas in place for the first half of February. Following 16 February’s announcement, however, the 50% cap would be removed, bringing the VTL quota for daily arrivals from 5,000 to 15,000 by 4 March.

For the cargo operations sector of SIA, a cargo load factor of 69% was recorded, or 25.6 percentage points lower on a YoY basis. The metric was in line with seasonal fluctuations. 

Cargo capacity was up 50.4% due to the progressive resumption of passenger flights. Following this increase was a 9.8% increase in cargo loads, as overall demand eased during the Chinese New Year period. 

Overall, SIA covered 63 destinations, while Scoot, SIA’s low-cost carrier subsidiary, served 37 destinations. Scoot, in particular, introduced a new destination, Miri, to its network. 

The Group predicts passenger capacity to continue on its upward trajectory to an estimated 57% of pre-Covid levels by April.