Department of Transportation: Airlines filled more seats in October
by January 12, 2017 2:12 pm 187 views
Use of commercial aircraft capacity rose slightly in October for scheduled domestic flights, the U.S. Department of Transportation’s Bureau of Transportation Statistics reported on Thursday (Jan. 12).
A decrease in airline passenger travel was mitigated by the fact that there were fewer seats available nationwide for domestic flights.
Load factor, calculated as a ratio of miles traveled by airline passengers to available seats, reached 85.5% nationwide, showing a 0.3-point increase since September.
There was decline of less than 1% for domestic commercial air travel, based on revenue passenger miles, and a more than 1% reduction of system capacity, based on available seat miles.
Both passenger travel and aircraft capacity reached an all-time high in September. The number of revenue passenger miles was 55.4 billion, and the available seat miles was 65.2 billion.
The usage rate for available seats in domestic flights was 85.2% in September and 83.7% in August.
October capacity use shows a decrease from 2015, when the load factor was 86.3%. However, the 2015 figure represents an all-time high for capacity use, according to the bureau.
Data has been seasonally adjusted and is based on reports from 81 airlines, including American Airlines, Delta Airlines, United Airlines, Southwest Airlines and Allegiant Air, all of which operate in the state’s primary airports. Glo Airlines, which offers flights to and from the Bill and Hillary Clinton National Airport (LIT) in Little Rock, did not report to the Bureau of Transportation Statistics for this study.
The latest capacity use numbers for Arkansas top two primary airports are from last July.
They show a decrease from 86.2% in June to 84% in July for the Clinton Airport and a decrease from 85% in July 2015, according to the bureau.
At Northwest Arkansas Regional Airport (XNA) in Highfill, capacity use was at 75.2% for July, down from 78% the previous month and down from 83.9% for the same time period in 2015.
The Arkansas data is not seasonally adjusted.