ROME, June 26 — Air traffic is booming this summer, but after European vacations are over will passenger demand hold up?
Some airlines, such as Ryanair, and countries, in particular Greece, have already recovered or even exceeded their 2019 daily flight numbers, according to Eurocontrol, a pan-European air traffic agency. “We’re now in a war economy in Europe, we have the prospect of a quite harsh recession, we have inflation at record levels, so how all of this is going to play into consumer sentiment... the jury’s still out.”
“We are entering... a period of uncertainty which we have never experienced in the last decade. And that of course is the biggest enemy of the business,” he said.Hololei listed the war in Ukraine, high energy prices and shortages of energy, food and labour.The price of jet fuel has doubled over the past year, with a refinery capacity shortage compounding the explosion in crude oil prices.
“People want to take their holidays,” she said, acknowledging, however, “we do worry about next year”.