Germany's leading airline, Lufthansa, said today that its entire group carried 8.83 million passengers in April, a big annualised gain owing to the damaging effects of the Icelandic volcano eruption a year ago.
The year-on-year gain for Lufthansa, which also owns Austrian Airlines, the British carrier bmi and Swiss, came to 31.5% a statement said, while the monthly increase was a more modest 7.8%.
Lufthansa by itself transported 5.47 million passengers in April, an annualised increase of 37.5%.
The group's critical passenger load factor was stable in April at 76.3%, as stronger results in Europe and the Americas offset political problems in North Africa and the Japanese natural disasters, the carrier said.
Lufthansa Cargo, the air freight subsidiary, carried 161,000 tonnes of goods last month, a gain of 24.8% on the year owing once again to poor results in the prior period owing to curtailed service during the volcanic eruption.
