Strong surge in air travel as governments relax travel restrictions: IATA

In February 2022, air travel rebounded strongly from January 2022, as Omicron-related impacts moderated outside Asia. February 2022 traffic (measured in revenue passenger kilometers or RPKs) was up 115.9% over February 2021. Compared with January 2021, January 2022 showed an increase of 83.1%. But compared with February 2019, traffic fell by 45.5%.

A 60.7% increase in domestic traffic was reported in February 2022 over the year-ago period, building on a 42.6% rise in January 2022. According to the International Air Transport Association (IATA), there were wide variations in markets. There was a 21.8% drop in domestic traffic in February compared with February 2019.

Middle Eastern airlines’ traffic rose 215.3% in February compared to February 2021, which was much higher than the 145.0% increase in January 2022 compared to January 2021. Compared to the same period last year, February capacity rose by 89.5%, and load factor increased by 25.8 percentage points to 64.7%.