Finnair carried 1,062,500 passengers in July 2023, which was 6.3% more than in July 2022 and 6.5% more than in June 2023.
It is the first time the carrier has flown more than one million passengers since February 2020, when global travel began to grind to a halt in the wake of the COVID pandemic.
In a statement on August 8, 2023, Finnair also confirmed that the closure of Russian airspace was having a negative impact on flights arriving from Asia.
“The negative impact of the Russian airspace closure especially on Asian passenger traffic figures, however, was still visible in July 2023 compared to the pre-pandemic figures,” the airline said.
The overall capacity, measured in Available Seat Kilometres (ASK), increased in July 2023, by 12% year-on-year and by 3.9% month-on-month.
Finnair’s traffic, measured in Revenue Passenger Kilometres (RPKs), also increased by 9.8% year-on-year and by 9.2% month-on-month.
The North Atlantic capacity decreased by 42.9% as the operations between Stockholm and North American destinations were discontinued at the end of October 2022.
The ASK increase in Asian traffic was 54.5% year-on-year explained by the additional capacity to Japan and South Korea, as well as a route opened to Mumbai in August 2022.
The airline also confirmed that in July 2023, 81.3% of all Finnair flights arrived on schedule.