No loss of load factors (198 words)

Published: 4/23/2001

Siberia Airlines (Sibir) reported that it increased its passenger traffic by 29% in the 1st quarter of 2001 from 143,106 to 184,783 passengers. A substantial improvement on the 7.5% increases of 2000 on 1999 for the same period. Flights increased by 18% to 1957, with aircraft spending 23% more hours in the air in the period according to the carrier. Despite the substantial growth in flights,including new destinations, load factors remained largely unchanged with 63.5% for seat load factor unchanged year on year and 63.8% for commercial load factor down 1% on the Q1 of 2000. The increase of traffic according to the airline, was attributable to: · Opening new routes Omsk, Munich, Hanover, Barnaul and Irkutsk · Linking with the Lufthansa network in July 2000 · Improved pricing and service packages for transit passengers attracting more passengers through Novosibirsk. · Increased market share on Novosibirsk-Moscow route due to exit of Transaero and Vnukovo Airlines ceasing flights. · Opening new representative offices in Frankfurt, Moscow, Sochi, Novokuznetsk giving potential passengers better access · Development of own domestic ticket sales through increased number of agents and training of existing agents.

Article ID: 2505