On October 20, Hong Kong carrier, Cathay Pacific, published its September 2023 traffic results signifying a comeback for the airline.
This article will cover the details surrounding Cathay Pacific’s September 2023 traffic results and its look ahead into the future.
Cathay Pacific – Traffic Results – September 2023
Kicking things off, Cathay Pacific carried a total of 1,542,144 passengers during September 2023, a whopping 480.1% increase when compared to September 2022. Coupled with this, the Hong Kong carrier also had a load factor of 83.7%, an 11.2 percentage points increase compared to September 2022.
September 2023’s RPKs (Revenue Passenger Kilometres) increased by 316% year-on-year as well as their ASKs (Available Seat Kilometres) increased by 260.4% year-on-year.
From a cargo perspective under the carriers’ Cathay Pacific Cargo arm, they carried a total of 119,963 tonnes during September 2023, a 15.3% increase compared to the same period in 2022. Whilst the carriers’ RFTKs (Cargo Revenue Tonne Kilometres) increased by 16.9% year-on-year with AFTKs (Available Cargo Tonne Kilometres) increased by 26.9% year-on-year.
Executive Comments
Cathay Pacific’s Chief Customer and Commercial Officer, Lavinia Lau, has said, “As we exited the busy peak summer months for passenger travel, we saw increased student traffic in September ahead of the start of the new school year, in particular to the UK.”
“To cater for the strong demand, we increased the frequency of our flights between Hong Kong and the UK in September, with our services from Hong Kong achieving load factors of 98%.”
“In addition to student traffic, there was a notable increase in outbound passenger travel from Hong Kong during the last week of September coinciding with the Mid-Autumn Festival and National Day holidays.”
“We also saw strong demand from the Greater Bay Area and the rest of the Chinese Mainland for travel both into Hong Kong and to destinations beyond around the holiday period. Meanwhile, demand to Hangzhou was elevated with the Asian Games, and Cathay Pacific was proud to carry a significant number of athletes, spectators and officials to attend this incredible sporting occasion.”
“It has also been great to see more conferences and exhibitions taking place in Hong Kong, which stimulated demand in the premium cabins as we near the traditional business travel peak.”
“On the cargo side, September marked the start of the traditional peak period and demand strengthened across most of the network compared with the previous month. Capacity also grew as passenger services were added on some key cargo routes.”
“E-commerce remained a bright spot, particularly on the Americas trade lanes. Our mail business continued to gain momentum, with several post offices around the world adopting our newly launched Cathay Mail solution to improve their customer experience.”
“Looking ahead at the coming months, on the travel side we will continue to increase capacity as much as is feasible to provide more choice and flexibility for our customers. Earlier this month, we resumed our Chicago passenger service, which received a very encouraging response from our customers. With the next holiday period not until Christmas, we will remain agile to capture demand, including connecting traffic via the Hong Kong hub.
“For cargo, loads are expected to build over the next two months reflecting the year-end demand, and we have been adding freighter capacity on our transpacific routes to cater for this.”
“Our intermodal sea-air feeder services from Dongguan will continue to see growth in throughput, providing customers a cost-effective option to move freight from the Greater Bay Area to the Hong Kong hub and onto our global network.”
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