700,000 passengers put Birmingham Airport on course for record year

Birmingham Airport is on course for a record-breaking year after nearly 700,000 passengers passed through its terminal last month.

The West Midlands gateway is expected to reach a total of 10 million passengers for this year, making it the busiest in the airport's 77-year history.

And bosses are already predicting another record-breaker in 2016, with a string of new airlines lined up to carry even more passengers in and out of Birmingham.

November's record-breaking passenger figure of 693,033 was 7.1 per cent up on the same month a year ago, with long-haul flights proving particularly popular with passenger numbers up 21.4 per cent.

It means the airport has broken passenger records in 10 out of the 11 months so far this year.

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Paul Kehoe, chief executive of Birmingham Airport, said: "November's figures are extremely encouraging particularly in regard to long haul services which are increasingly in demand.

"We expect December to also be very strong as we welcome passengers over the busy holiday period. If December turns out to be another record-breaking month it will be the eleventh one this year which is fantastic news.

"2015 has been our most successful year to date but we are confident that we will set new passenger growth records in 2016 as we increase our destination choices and frequency of flights. We are also very excited to be introducing new airlines CSA, Qatar, Iberia and Blue Air to Birmingham".

Regular scheduled traffic in November accounted for 93 per cent of the total with charter passengers making up the rest.

One hundred percent growth was achieved on new scheduled routes to New York-JFK, Warsaw and Madrid, as well as significant year-on-year passenger growth to Budapest, Palma, Barcelona, Reykjavik, Berlin, Delhi, Amritsar, Rome and Milan.

Charter traffic destinations which experienced significant growth were Madeira, Cancun, Fuerteventura, Gran Canaria, Bridgetown and Hurgada on Egypts Red Sea Riviera.