Rio de Janeiro air traffic up 20% in 2011
Rio de Janeiro’s Galeão International Airport hit a record 2011, handling almost 15 million passengers. Last week saw the arrival of the first Emirates flight from Dubai, which then continued on to Buenos Aires in Argentina. Around 25% of the airport’s traffic is on international services.
In just eight years, passenger numbers at the airport have more than trebled from just over 4.5 million in 2003 to their current levels. In 2011 alone, traffic has risen by around 20%.
Traffic peaks typically occur in October and January. Monthly traffic has been up by more than 10% every month this year with the exception of February (+7%).
TAM and GOL share 70% of capacity
The airport’s biggest carriers are Brazil’s two biggest airlines; GOL and TAM. Between them, they share almost 70% of all scheduled seat capacity. WebJet ranks third with just 6% of the market, while Azul is fourth with less than 5%, having only started operating from the airport last February. It now serves five destinations non-stop, three of which started in late December. Emirates, thanks to its flights to Dubai and Buenos Aires, jumps straight into fifth place.
European services growing
The US and Argentina are the biggest international markets, but there are plenty of non-stop services to Europe as well. TAM serves London and Paris with non-stop flights, while Air France (Paris CDG), British Airways (London Heathrow), Iberia (Madrid), and TAP Portugal (Lisbon and Porto) have all been serving Europe for a while.
In June 2011, Alitalia started serving Rio from Rome, while the start of the latest winter season saw both KLM (three times weekly from Amsterdam) and Lufthansa (five times weekly from Frankfurt) introduce new direct services.
