Dublin Airport has recorded the busiest June in its 77-year history, with 2.9m passengers using the airport, a rise of 6pc on the same month last year.
The number of passengers this June was up 300,000 on May’s figure – and the latest figures reveal Dublin’s growing importance as a hub. More than 650,000 passengers used it as a gateway to connect onward to another destination between January and June, a 46pc increase over the same period last year.
A recent Airports Council International report showed that Dublin’s hub connectivity has increased by 286pc over the past 10 years.
Vincent Harrison, MD of Dublin Airport
But there will be concern over the Brexit slump, with traffic to and from Britain (844,000 passengers) remaining static compared to June 2016. The news follows last month’s CSO figures showing that, overall, revenue from British visitors into Ireland has fallen almost 8pc in the first three months of the year.
The number of passengers travelling to and from continental Europe grew by 7pc with almost 1.6m passengers flying to and from European destinations. Transatlantic traffic increased by 18pc, with 385,000 people travelling.
Other international traffic, which includes flights to the Middle East and North Africa, grew by 6pc as 71,500 passengers travelled. But the number of passengers on domestic flights declined by 8pc in June, with over 8,000 people taking flights within the Republic last month.
More than 13.8m passengers travelled through Dublin Airport in the first six months of the year, a 6pc increase (804,000 passengers) on the same period last year. It’s been reported that the DAA is forecasting that passenger numbers will reach 30.4m by 2019.
