Frankfurt Airport reports first-half growth

About 5.6 million passengers travelled through Frankfurt Airport (FRA) in June 2024, an increase of 1.4 percent year-on-year. Last year’s June passenger numbers were additionally boosted by the different timing of the Whitsun holiday, falling in June last year but already occurring in May this year. Compared to pre-Covid levels, passenger traffic in June 2024 was still about 14.4 percent below the 2019 levels.

During the January-to-June 2024 period, a total of some 28.8 million passengers traveled via FRA – a gain of 7.0 percent year-on-year. However, passenger numbers in the first half were still 14.5 percent lower than in the corresponding pre-pandemic period of 2019.

Fraport AG’s CEO, Dr. Stefan Schulte, said: “In the first half of the year, we increased passenger numbers by 1.8 million and welcomed about 28.8 million travelers in Frankfurt. Without the numerous strikes at the beginning of the year, we would have served about 500,000 more passengers in the first half. Despite this shortfall, we are on track to achieve the projected volume of between 61 million and 65 million passengers for the full year. At the same time, the recovery in the German aviation market is still being held back by high location-specific costs imposed by regulators. In terms of passenger recovery, our home market ranks last in Europe and will not move forward without a fresh impetus for growth. Other regions of the world are much more dynamic, as evidenced by our Group airports in Greece, Antalya and Lima, all of which have surpassed pre-crisis levels again.”

Cargo traffic in Frankfurt (comprising airfreight and airmail) continued to grow noticeably by 11.4 percent year-on-year to 178,324 metric tons in June. Aircraft movements were up 1.5 percent year-on-year to 39,475 takeoffs and landings. Likewise, accumulated maximum takeoff weights (or MTOWs) rose by 2.3 percent year-on-year to about 2.5 million metric tons in the reporting month.

Across the Group, most of the airports in Fraport’s international portfolio also recorded passenger growth in June 2024. Traffic at Ljubljana Airport (LJU) in Slovenia’s capital city continued to increase significantly by 15.3 percent year-on-year to 148,159 passengers. In contrast, the two Brazilian airports of Fortaleza (FOR) and Porto Alegre (POA) saw combined traffic plummet by 53.8 percent to 495,771 passengers in the reporting month. This was mainly due to the suspension of flight operations at POA since May 3 as a result of the heavy flooding in the region. Currently, a contingency schedule is in place for Porto Alegre, with only a limited number of domestic flights being operated from a nearby military base. In neighboring Peru, traffic at Lima Airport (LIM) surged by 16.0 percent year-on-year to around 1.9 million passengers. In Europe, Fraport’s 14 Greek regional airports welcomed a total of 5.3 million passengers, up 5.9 percent year-on-year. The two Bulgarian coastal airports of Burgas (BOJ) and Varna (VAR) registered a 12.5 traffic decrease to 481,635 passengers in the reporting month. Meanwhile, Antalya Airport (AYT) on the Turkish Riviera achieved a noticeable 8.6 percent gain in passenger traffic, serving some 4.9 million travelers in June 2024.

Total traffic at the airports actively managed by the Fraport Group grew by 2.2 percent year-on-year to approximately 18.9 million passengers in the reporting month.