Spain lost 9 out of 10 international air passengers in the first quarter

The number of passengers arriving in Spain on international flights decreased by 87.5% during the first three months of 2021 compared to January, February and March of last year. A year of pandemic in which the number has decreased to 1.65 million international travelers, according to data released this Thursday by Turespaña.

Bearing in mind that at the end of March last year, the epidemic was already noticeable, the decline is even more pronounced if you compare the data two years ago, with a 90.4% drop in international passengers in 2021.

tourism

A further decrease in the number of passengers at low-cost companies

Low-cost carriers (CBC) international passenger traffic recorded a decrease of 93% year-on-year (from 94.7% compared to 2019), to 495,175, while conventional airlines recorded a decrease of 81.1% (from 85, 2%), by 1.16 million.

62.4% came from the European Union and the United Kingdom, down 93.6% (from 98.6% for 2019), respectively. For its part, the influx from the rest of the world, which is 37.6%, suffered a decrease of 86.1% (97% compared to 2019).

In the last month of March, 660,000 passengers from international airports arrived in Spain, 71.8% less than in March of last year (90% less than in 2019).

70.2% of them chose traditional airlines to travel, a decrease of 58.4% compared to 2020 (from 84.6% with 2019), while those who traveled with low-cost airlines, the remaining 29.8%, decreased by 84% (94.5%). . % Less than two years).

Travel to Spain

The country of origin most resistant to the crisis is Turkey, while passengers from the United Kingdom have fallen the most

In March and the first three months as a whole, all the tourism-related countries that showed big traffic numbers fell, with Turkey the lowest, down 31.5%. On the other side of the scale, riders from the UK were the lowest, 96.5% less than last year. In fact, the UK held only 2.9% of the received passengers in March.

Passenger arrivals from Germany (24.5%) decreased by 53% in March, which affected all Autonomous Communities, among them the Canary Islands, in absolute terms.

France attracted 12.3% of the passengers arriving in Spain in March, with an annual decline of 56.8% affecting all societies, especially Catalonia, the community of Madrid and Andalusia.

tourism

The Community of Madrid received about half of the passengers, a decrease of 81.4%.

Madrid was the community with the most access in the first quarter, around half the number of registrants, with a share of 44.6% (738,740 passengers). Of course, 81.4% less than in 2020 and 84.7% less than in 2019.

Catalonia monopolized 25.5% of the passengers who traveled to Spain in a low-cost company in the first quarter, with 126,447, 93.3% less than last year; The Canary Islands followed with 24.1%, a decrease of 91.7%.