Heathrow Airport has recorded its busiest ever November with over 6.2 million passengers traveling through the airport, ahead of reuniting even more family and friends for the festive period.
Passengers heading to the US to celebrate Thanksgiving helped push up traffic figures on the back of new services. BA and American introduced new links to Pittsburgh and increased flights on a number of routes. Delta and Virgin increased frequency to Boston and Detroit, and started flights to Las Vegas.
Heathrow brought a taste of the US to the airport’s arrivals halls, surprising passengers with hundreds of Thanksgiving pumpkin pies in November.
As people across the UK made their preparations for reuniting with family and friends, Heathrow handled over 134 thousand metric tons of cargo.
Scandinavian Airlines System (SAS) was named the best airline based on noise and emissions performance at Heathrow in Q3, assisted by the introduction of A320neos, better track-keeping and continuous descent approach.
Nearly 300 small to medium sized businesses attended the 23rd annual flagship Heathrow Business Summit and 87 apprentices graduated from the Heathrow Employment and Skills Academy.
The airport revealed a cutting-edge centralized tracking system for expansion that will help to coordinate construction between the four logistics hubs that will be announced next year.
Heathrow Chief Executive John Holland-Kaye, said:
“Following a record breaking November, we are expecting this festive getaway to be the biggest yet as family and friends travel home. As demand for air travel increases, we are working with the aviation and energy industries to decarbonise flight. We are accelerating our own plans to cut emissions from Heathrow airport operations and those will be carbon neutral from 2020.”
November 2019 | ||||||
Terminal Passengers (000s) |
Nov 2019 | % Change | Jan to Nov 2019 |
% Change | Dec 2018 to Nov 2019 |
% Change |
Market | ||||||
UK | 415 | 8.7 | 4,444 | 0.2 | 4,802 | -0.4 |
EU | 2,090 | -0.3 | 25,308 | -0.7 | 27,415 | -0.3 |
Non-EU Europe | 422 | -3.0 | 5,222 | -0.6 | 5,689 | -0.5 |
Africa | 285 | -4.3 | 3,204 | 6.3 | 3,528 | 6.6 |
North America | 1,417 | 5.6 | 17,282 | 3.8 | 18,732 | 3.8 |
Latin America | 111 | 5.9 | 1,265 | 2.6 | 1,382 | 2.9 |
Middle East | 613 | 10.1 | 7,007 | 0.6 | 7,700 | 0.5 |
Asia / Pacific | 880 | -2.1 | 10,456 | -0.9 | 11,436 | -0.8 |
Total | 6,234 | 2.0 | 74,188 | 0.8 | 80,684 | 0.9 |
Air Transport Movements | Nov 2019 | % Change | Jan to Nov 2019 |
% Change | Dec 2018 to Nov 2019 |
% Change |
Market | ||||||
UK | 3,535 | 16.2 | 37,327 | 4.2 | 40,219 | 3.2 |
EU | 16,344 | -3.0 | 193,085 | -1.4 | 209,746 | -1.1 |
Non-EU Europe | 3,494 | -3.1 | 40,009 | -0.1 | 43,669 | 0.1 |
Africa | 1,257 | -4.3 | 13,873 | 6.3 | 15,260 | 6.8 |
North America | 6,492 | 2.2 | 76,681 | 1.0 | 83,349 | 1.0 |
Latin America |
473 | -4.4 | 5,508 | 0.8 | 6,038 | 1.4 |
Middle East | 2,557 | 5.9 | 27,921 | -0.4 | 30,547 | -0.3 |
Asia / Pacific | 3,793 | -3.5 | 43,147 | 0.6 | 47,257 | 1.0 |
Total | 37,945 | -0.1 | 437,551 | 0.1 | 476,085 | 0.3 |
Cargo (Metric Tonnes) |
Nov 2019 | % Change | Jan to Nov 2019 |
% Change | Dec 2018 to Nov 2019 |
% Change |
Market | ||||||
UK | 52 | 24.9 | 538 | -38.7 | 577 | -40.5 |
EU | 7,715 | -10.1 | 87,433 | -15.3 | 95,056 | -15.4 |
Non-EU Europe | 5,047 | -4.0 | 52,672 | -0.1 | 57,076 | -0.2 |
Africa | 7,988 | -8.5 | 86,080 | 4.4 | 93,981 | 4.7 |
North America | 47,707 | -8.4 | 518,870 | -8.2 | 569,715 | -7.8 |
Latin America | 4,479 | -12.8 | 50,159 | 5.1 | 54,805 | 4.7 |
Middle East | 22,838 | 3.9 | 238,120 | 0.9 | 259,167 | 0.4 |
Asia / Pacific | 38,502 | -14.9 | 427,407 | -9.8 | 468,679 | -9.2 |
Total | 134,328 | -8.6 | 1,461,280 | -6.4 | 1,599,056 | -6.2 |
Traffic Summary | ||||||
September 2017 | ||||||
Terminal Passengers (000s) |
Month | % Change | Jan to Sep 2017 |
% Change | Oct 2016 to Sep 2017 |
% Change |
Heathrow | 6,929 | 2.0 | 59,069 | 3.1 | 77,434 | 2.8 |
Air Transport Movements | Month | % Change | Jan to Sep 2017 |
% Change | Oct 2016 to Sep 2017 |
% Change |
Heathrow | 40,623 | 0.0 | 356,865 | -0.2 | 472,611 | 0.1 |
Cargo (Metric Tonnes) |
Month | % Change | Jan to Sep 2017 |
% Change | Oct 2016 to Sep 2017 |
% Change |
Heathrow | 140,643 | 11.5 | 1,246,246 | 10.5 | 1,659,381 | 9.2 |
Market comparison (000s) |
Month | % Change | Jan to Sep 2017 |
% Change | Oct 2016 to Sep 2017 |
% Change |
Market | ||||||
UK | 418 | -0.6 | 3,587 | 3.0 | 4,752 | 2.1 |
Europe | 2,937 | 2.0 | 24,748 | 2.6 | 32,356 | 2.5 |
Africa | 271 | -1.4 | 2,337 | -0.7 | 3,149 | -0.5 |
North America | 1,556 | 0.4 | 13,183 | 1.0 | 17,306 | 0.6 |
Latin America | 111 | 9.3 | 972 | 4.1 | 1,264 | 2.2 |
Middle East | 668 | 5.1 | 5,763 | 10.5 | 7,509 | 10.4 |
Asia / Pacific | 967 | 4.0 | 8,479 | 4.0 | 11,099 | 3.4 |
Total | 6,929 | 2.0 | 59,069 | 3.1 | 77,434 | 2.8 |