Adelaide suffers profit drop

Chairman David Munt said the grounding of Tiger Airways and its decision not to resume services to Adelaide, coupled with industrial problems at Qantas, had impacted on the company’s finances in the past financial year.

Mr Munt said, in the annual report, that “after a tumultuous 2010-11 largely due to the impact of natural disasters both home and abroad, it was hoped the aviation sector might return to some sense of normality.”

However, other events such as ongoing global uncertainty and subdued economic conditions had conspired to keep a lid on passenger growth, with an overall reduction in overall passenger traffic from 7.4 million to 7.1 million in the past year, he said.

Domestic traffic through the airport fell 6.1 percent to 5.84 million passengers, but regional traffic showed a moderate increase and international traffic rose 11.5 percent to 660,700 passengers – a figure expected to grow this year following the start of Emirates services on November 1.

At the same time, Tiger also returned with a limited service between Adelaide and Melbourne, with the promise of more flights following the deal with Virgin Australia.

Mr Munt said the AAL financial position remained strong and was enabling the company to continue investment in infrastructure.

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This included the new $100 million multi-level car park, which opened recently and doubled short-term parking spaces at the airport.

“The company remains confident that notwithstanding any external challenges, its underlying strength and ongoing infrastructure investment will quickly see a return to positive passenger growth,” Mr Munt said.

Managing director Mark Young said that, following completion of the car park, AAL was advancing its plans to expand the passenger terminal with an enlarged aircraft parking area and more gates at the north-eastern end of the building.

Chris Milne