Page 4 - World ATM Directory & ANSP Report 2023

INTRODUCTION
ATM RETURNS TO NORMALITY IN 2023
The air transport industry bounced back strongly in 2023, with traffic across all metrics and regions finally approaching or even exceeding pre-pandemic levels.
The year had a robust beginning. The number of flights in January 2023 was 25% up on the same period in 2022, with close to 3.5 million civil aircraft in operation. Aside
from the ongoing recovery in all regions, the industry benefitted from the opening of the Chinese market when COVID restrictions were lifted early in the year. The move was a welcome boost to industry confidence. Asia naturally reaped the greatest rewards, and on average had an extra 4,800 flights every day during January.
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Flight Hours (2019)
Flight Hours (2020)
Flight Hours (2021)
Flight Hours (2022)
Flight Hours (2023)
Global flight hours are an important metric of ATM workload. The daily post pandemic high was set on July 28, 2024 when 269,000 flight hours were operated globally. In November daily flight hours ranged between 224,000 and 248,000 hours.
The steady increase in traffic over the next few months meant that in April 3.99 million flights were operated globally, some 29% higher than April 2019. The daily flight peak was comparable to the busiest days in July and August 2022 and with the northern hemisphere summer on the horizon, industry prospects were on the up. Indeed, July numbers were predictably high and reached an average of 142,800 flights and 261,500 flight hours daily. The Asia Pacific region performed especially well as many countries experienced the first unrestricted holiday season for three years.
In Europe, however, capacity issues once again reared their head during the peak summer season. Fortunately, airport and airline staffing shortages – a key factor in the delays in summer 2022 – had a minimal impact in 2023. Moreover, all affected air navigation services providers
(ANSP) worked to reduce delays and cancellations and passenger disruption was kept to a minimum.
There was growing concern over weather impacts though, including severe thunderstorms, flooding and wildfires. EUROCONTROL has estimated that removing weather impacts would have reduced per flight air traffic flow management (ATFM) delays 18% in the 2023 European summer. Not surprisingly, EUROCONTROL’s Network Manager and its operational partners have made mitigating bad weather one of the main priorities for 2024.
Traffic numbers dipped slightly in the last quarter of 2023 but that is the norm as the northern hemisphere enters the fall / winter season. Even so, the 4.21 million flights operated globally in October 2023 was a 16% increase on the October 2022 figure and 23.3% higher than the 3.41 million flights in October 2019.
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WORLD ATM DIRECTORY & ANSP REPORT 2024
THOUSANDS