Dubai air traffic drop at 70%

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Dubai International Airport saw the coronavirus pandemic push passenger traffic down by an unprecedented 70% in 2020 compared to the previous year, its CEO announced Monday, even as the airport held onto its prized title as the world’s busiest for international travel.

In this Dec 11, 2019 file photo, an Emirates jetliner comes in for landing at Dubai International Airport in Dubai. The airport saw the coronavirus pandemic push passenger traffic down by an unprecedented 70% in 2020, its CEO announced on Feb 15, 2021, even as the airport held onto its prized title as the world’s busiest for international travel. (AP)

While the key east-west transit point started to see an uptick in traffic after long-haul carrier Emirates resumed its routes last summer, the airport’s 2020 passenger load of 25.9 million is still a trickle compared to 2019. Airlines slashed their schedules and flights declined by more than 50%. For months as the travel industry collapsed worldwide, dubai’s massive airport, which saw 86.4 million passengers in 2019, became a ghost-town of shuttered shops. One of its two main terminals shut down.

“It was very, very dramatic,” Paul Griffiths, CEO of dubai Airports, told The Associated Press. “And of course, we had to respond in a very dramatic way to keep our liquidity.” The airport slashed its workforce from 8,000 to 3,000, Griffiths said, with frontline service and maintenance staff taking the biggest hit.

But recovery gained momentum in December as the city promoted itself as a pandemic-friendly vacation spot for tourists fleeing tough restrictions back home. In December alone, passenger volumes surpassed industry expectations at 2.19 million, the airport said.

Israelis flocked to the United Arab Emirates after a breakthrough normalization deal and lockdownweary travelers poured in to celebrate the holidays and New Year’s Eve at crowded bars and luxury hotels. (AP)

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