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AIRLINE

Economic boom boosts air traffic

The current economic boom is sending us flying. According to new forecasts from the Civil Aviation Administration (Luftfartsverket - LFV), the number of flight movements in Swedish air space is up by 4,5 percent - from 650,000 movements last year to a predicted 680,000 movements in 2011.

Published: 4 June 2011 12:09 CEST

Flight movements are all take offs, landings and overflights.

These joyous figures for the airline industry are echoed in flight passenger statistics. 17,9 million passengers are expected to travel from Swedish airports in 2011, which would be a record high.

The current record is 17,4 million passengers, a figure which was reached in 2008.

The main explanation behind our increased flying is the strong economy, and the trend isn’t limited to Swedish airspace, but apparent throughout Europe.

Not even the recent ash cloud following the eruption of Grimsvotn, the Icelandic volcano, is expected to affect the record-high figures.

“The development has been very strong during the first months of the year. Even including the latest ash cloud, we feel secure in this forecast,” Lars Ahlm, business intelligence analyst at LFV, told newspaper Svenska Dagbladet.

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AIRLINE

Airline Norwegian posts 15 billion kroner loss after nightmare 2020

Low cost airline Norwegian has registered a loss of 14.9 billion Norwegian kroner for 2020, a year in which the company saw a drastic reduction in passenger numbers and was on the brink of bankruptcy.

Published: 26 February 2021 13:18 CET
A file photo of a Norwegian Air Shuttle plane in Finland.
A file photo of a Norwegian Air Shuttle plane in Finland. Heikki Saukkomaa / Lehtikuva / AFP

Low cost airline Norwegian has registered a loss of 14.9 billion Norwegian kroner for 2020, a year in which the company saw a drastic reduction in passenger numbers and was on the brink of bankruptcy.

The company published its annual results on Friday, revealing the huge operating loss.

Norwegian’s 2019 result, a loss of around 1.7 billion kroner, had put the company in a difficult position even prior to the outbreak of the Covid-19 pandemic.

The coronavirus outbreak and its consequent travel restrictions reduced the company’s passenger numbers to 6.9 million in 2020. That is 29 million fewer than in 2019.

Not all of the loss is due to fewer passengers. Around half of the company’s devaluation is attributed to a depreciation of the value of its aircraft fleet, news wire Ritzau reports.

“2020 was an exceptionally demanding year for air travel and for Norwegian,” CEO Jacob Schram said in a statement on the annual results.

“In light of that, the result for the fourth quarter (of 2020) is not surprising. Unfortunately, the majority of our employees are furloughed and many have lost their jobs – in part because of the closure of long distance services,” he added.

The company was already in debt prior to the pandemic and is now under bankruptcy protection in Ireland and is undergoing similar process in Norway.

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