Tonnage rise in September for Finnair

Aircraft manufacturers Asia Pacific Europe

October 11, 2016

In September, Finnair’s revenue tonne kilometres grew year-on-year (YOY) by a significant 24.8 per cent to 11,972 tonnes and after nine months of the year tonnage has grown YOY by 15.8 per cent to 96,667 tonnes.

The carrier saw strong growth on European, North Atlantic and Asian trade lanes last month – up YOY 33.8 per cent, 36.3 per cent and 22.1 per cent, respectively.

Cargo capacity in available tonne kilometres grew by 4.8 per cent in September to 124.3 million. Finnair’s total freight capacity included two weekly freighter flights between Helsinki and Brussels and two weekly freighter flights shared with IAG Cargo between Helsinki and London, both operated by DHL, the latter being replaced by a regular Airbus A350 five times a week in the first week of October.

In September the load factor was 63.9 per cent, 10.1 percentage points up on the same month last year and for the nine months of 2016 it is 57.3 per cent, 4.1 percentage points up on the same period last year.

Finnair’s chief financial officer, Pekka Vähähyyppä says unit revenues declined, but strong volume growth balanced this partially.

James Graham

James Graham is an award-winning transport media journalist with a long background in the commercial freight sector, including commercial aviation and the aviation supply chain. He was the initial Air Cargo Week journalist and retuned later for a stint as editor. He continues his association as editor of the monthly supplements. He has reported for the newspaper from global locations as well as the UK.