Cathay Pacific passenger traffic rises 30% in May

The airline carried some 24,000 passengers during the month.

Cathay Pacific reported it carried a total of 24,006 passengers in May, reflecting an increase of 30% compared to May 2020, yet still a 99.2% decrease from its pre-pandemic level in May 2019.

The revenue passenger kilometres (RPKs) during the month also climbed 24.5% year-on-year, but is 98.9% down from May 2018 figures. Meanwhile, passenger load factor went down by 2.9 percentage points to 26.7% whilst capacity increased 38%.

“We have begun cautiously adding more flights and destinations to our schedule. There was a small 6.6% month-on-month increase in passenger capacity in May with the resumption of services to Fuzhou, Hangzhou and Dubai,” Ronald Lam, Cathay Pacific Group Chief Customer and Commercial Officer, said.

“Nevertheless, we still operated only 3.5% of the capacity that we operated prior to the pandemic in May 2019,” he also said, adding that the average daily passenger numbers remained low at 774.

An increased demand was also seen from its services in the UK, particularly in London driven by sales from Hong Kong and mainland China. These markets have also driven demand in its US routes.

In contrast, demand in other markets, such as the Philippines and Taiwan, are still weak due to the flight ban and reported rising cases of COVID-19.

Moreover, the airline carried 92,394 tonnes of cargo and mail last month, a decrease of 6.4% compared to May 2020.

The month’s revenue freight tonne kilometres (RFTKs) fell 16.9% YoY. The cargo and mail load factor increased by 7.5 percentage points to 81%, whilst capacity was down by 24.5%.