New statistics from Finavia released on Wednesday show a continued steep decline of passengers at Helsinki Airport.
According to the company there were 91% fewer passengers in October than the same time last year; the number of flights decreased 77% and the volume of cargo fell 51% as well.
“The situation is very worrying for Helsinki-Vantaa, which lives on international exchange traffic and through which regional airports also thrive. The number of transfer passengers decreased by 95 percent compared to last year” says Kimmo Mäki, Finavia’s CEO.
In 2019 half of Helsinki’s 22 million passengers were international travelers, and half were Finns - and a total of 26 million passengers passed through Finavia’s airports across the country last year.
“When Helsinki-Vantaa’s international traffic is at a standstill, flights at the provincial airports have also stopped. Normally, when a large number of people flying to Helsinki continue their journey abroad” says Mäki.
Despite the coronavirus circumstances, work continues to upgrade parts of the airport’s infrastructure.
“Despite the economic difficulties caused by the corona crisis, we decided to continue our investment program because we want to be ready as the virus eases and the world opens up. When we are able to complete the Helsinki-Vantaa development program, we can have an advantage over our other competitors” Kimmo Mäki explains.
The airport’s biggest airline, Finnair, had cut up to 90% of its flight schedules this spring and summer due to the coronavirus crisis. The second wave of infections around the world, coupled with ongoing strict travel restrictions to curb the spread of the virus, means that flight scheduled have no returned to anything near normal levels.
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