Aeroflot Group’s January passenger traffic up by 14.5 per cent

At the end of 2019’s first month, the flag carrier operated a fleet of 253 aircraft (Aeroflot)

Aeroflot Group, Russia’s largest fraternity of airlines that consists of Aeroflot, Rossiya Airlines, low-cost carrier (LCC) Pobeda Airlines and the far east of Russia-based Aurora Airlines, collectively carried some 4.2 million passengers in January, a year-on-year increase of 14.5 per cent and which is above the local air transport market’s 10 per cent improvement.

Each carrier demonstrated contrasting operational results in the period though. The two biggest contributors, both in terms of passengers carried and growth rates, were Aeroflot and LCC Pobeda.

The group and the flag-carrier airline’s RPKs were each up by 14.3 and 9.6 per cent year-on-year. ASKs rose by 16.4 per cent for Aeroflot Group and by 12.3 per cent for Aeroflot airline.

The country’s market leader and flag carrier is Aeroflot-Russian Airlines and it served 2.78 million passengers in the month, up 13.4 per cent year-on-year, although its seat load factor decreased by 1.8 percentage points to 73.2.

For the first time, Pobeda, Russia’s only LCC, climbed to third place in the country’s largest airlines league table, having carried 689,100 passengers, an impressive 43.7 per cent year-on-year improvement. Its seat load factor also suffered, decreasing by 2.7 points to 91.5 per cent.

Meanwhile the St Petersburg-based Rossiya continues to idle, having transported 640,600 passengers in the first month of the year, marginally down by 0.7 per cent year-on-year, with its seat load factor falling by 1.2 to 79.9 per cent.

At the same time, the operational performance of Aurora, the group’s eastern regional subsidiary, remained almost flat, with a marginal passenger traffic growth of just one percentage point to 107,450 passengers. Its seat load factor was weak too, at 61.9 per cent (down from the 4.9 recorded in January 2018).

In January, Aeroflot Group brought in two Boeing 737-800s and Aurora phased-out one Bombardier DHC8-300 turboprop so that, at the end of January, the group’s fleet list totalled 367 aircraft. There were no changes to Aeroflot’s fleet in January. At the end of 2019’s first month, the flag carrier operated a fleet of 253 aircraft.