ALKHOBAR, 16 December — International airlines operating from King Fahd International Airport in Dammam have witnessed a big decline in the number of passengers traveling during the Eid and winter breaks. The worst affected airlines were those operating in European and American sectors. Airlines operating in the Asian market did comparatively better.
However, travel agencies and some airlines operating to America and Europe say that the condition, which had worsened after the Sept. 11 terrorist attack, was limping back to normalcy.
“We were hoping that the number of passengers traveling to American and European destinations will increase during the Eid holidays, but it did not happen,” said an executive of Kanoo Holidays. However, he admitted that there was a slight improvement compared to conditions a month ago.
But airlines operating to Asian destinations — such as India, Sri Lanka, Bangladesh, Pakistan and the Philippines — said that there were fewer passengers this year compared to previous years during the same period.
In the last few years expatriate workers have traveled to their respective countries around this time of the year to celebrate Eid and Christmas with their families. Since this year the Eid holiday was once again coupled with the winter break in the schools, the travel industry had expectations of a big surge in traffic.
Philippine Airlines has already ceased its operations from KFIA and as a result Saudia as well as Gulf Air, PIA and the Emirates share the traffic. This is considered to be the most lucrative Asian sector after India.
However, this year many Filipinos did not travel for winter vacation.
Many airlines operating from Bahrain also suffered a setback due to this decline. The situation in the Indian sector remains comparatively buoyant. Air-India reported full flights and they have closed reservations until Dec. 22.
Saudia and the Gulf Air also reported full flights from Dec. 11 to 15.
Sunil Deshmukh, manager of Air India in the Eastern Province, told Arab News that, compared to the summer vacation period, his airline did good business this season.
“We have full flights until Dec. 22 and we have to put our off-loaded passengers onto other airlines like Saudia,” he said.
In fact, Sept. 11 has brought some kind of sanity to the airline industry in the region, as there has been a decline in fare undercutting in the Asian sector.
Previously, it has been a free-for-all situation where many airlines were giving huge discounts to travel agencies in order to attract passengers. But this winter, the undercutting has almost disappeared and it appears that these airlines have at last reached some kind of understanding on fare structure.
