Dubai April airport passenger traffic jumps 19%

DUBAI: Passenger traffic through Dubai International Airport climbed 18.7 percent in April from a year earlier and should maintain that pace of growth in coming months, airport authorities said.
Passenger traffic totaled 5.42 million people in April, exceeding 5 million for a fifth straight month.
The largest absolute increase in total passenger numbers during April was recorded on western European routes.
Some Middle Eastern routes that were affected by political instability last year grew moderately in April, the airport operator said.
“It is very clear that our growth rate has picked up and that should continue at a similar pace into the next quarter and beyond,” Paul Griffiths, chief executive of Dubai Airports, said in a statement.
Growth was slightly slower than a 20.6 percent increase in March but well above low to mid double-digit rates since earlier in the year.
Freight volume through the airport rose 7.3 percent to 199,985 tons in April; in the first four months of this year, it climbed 11.5 percent to 784,832 tons.