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Adelaide Airport breaks through 8 million barrier in 2016

written by australianaviation.com.au | January 17, 2017

China Southern flight CZ663, operated by Airbus A330-200 B-6135 receives an ARFF monitor cross after arriving in Adelaide. (Adelaide Airport/Simon Casson)
China Southern started nonstop flights to Adelaide in December. (Adelaide Airport/Simon Casson)

Adelaide Airport says it exceeded eight million passengers for the first time in 2016 and is hopeful of further growth in the current year amid new international and domestic flights.

The airport said on Tuesday it handled 8.007 million passengers in the 12 months to December 31 2016, an increase of 2.5 per cent from the prior corresponding period.

International passengers grew 5.9 per cent to 924,000, while the number of domestic and regional travellers at the airport was up 2.1 per cent to 7.083 million.

The airport benefitted from the arrival of Qatar Airways in May 2016 and China Southern in December 2016, while on the domestic front Jetstar commenced nonstop flights from Adelaide to Melbourne Avalon and Sunshine Coast airports.

And there is more new capacity planned for 2017 with Fiji Airways set to link Adelaide and Nadi with twice weekly flights from June using Boeing 737-800 equipment.

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Fiji Airways heading to Adelaide

Adelaide Airport managing director Mark Young said the airport was on track to reach one million international passengers in 2017.

“Adelaide Airport has come a long way in a relatively short time, particularly since the opening of the new terminal just over a decade ago,” Young said in a statement.

“Our next likely milestone will be to hit one million international passengers per year, and there is a good chance we’ll reach that mark in the course of the 2017/18 financial year.”

Adelaide Airport is building 14 new self-service bag drop and 32 check-in kiosks as part of a technology upgrade and contact extension with technology provider SITA.

Further, a new on-site hotel was expected to open its doors to guest by the end of 2018 as part of the 30-year, $2 billion site development plan that also included expanding Adelaide’s existing domestic and international terminals.

“There are positive signs for future growth, and importantly we are continuing to upgrade facilities to cater for that demand,” Young said.

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Comments (14)

  • Will

    says:

    Great to see Adelaide Airport finally breaking the 8 million mark. Just goes to show that there is demand for international travel here in Adelaide and that we can support international flights, hopefully Adelaide and the state government will be able to make a deal with an american airline or even Qantas for mainland US flights. Just goes to show that there is demand here and more and more international airlines are catching on.

  • Tim

    says:

    It wouldn’t surprise me if there is an announcement by Etihad some time this year.

  • Jack

    says:

    There is a lot of potential for more non-stop Adelaide to New Zealand flights. Currently, less than 1/3 of those travelling between SA and NZ do so on the non-stop Air NZ AKL-ADL service. Most of the rest are flying via MEL/SYD

  • GBRGB

    says:

    On the domestic front I would have thought a 3 x week service to places like Townsville would be well supported both ways. It would probably be Jetstar or would make a good initial service for Tiger also.

  • Brett

    says:

    I think the next logical connection for Adelaide is a direct service to the US West Coast. I know this has been on the wish list for a while, the only question is which airline and when..

    Qantas could deliver this service with the B787-9, but I suggest that it will be one of the primary US carriers that will beat QF to this route in the near future.

  • David

    says:

    Would like to see a Qantas 789 service do ADL – AKL – LAX or DFW. This would cater for both NZ and US traffic with one service. Believe that AKL – DFW isn’t currently operated by any carrier.

  • Tim

    says:

    I find it very odd that since Qantas decided to give Adelaide a miss with international flights we have had Emirates, Air New Zealand, Qatar, China Southern and now Fiji Airways operating out of Adelaide.
    I presume these companies (except Fiji yet) are operating profitably so where the hell is Qantas?

  • Will

    says:

    Thats a fair point Tim, i wonder the same thing myself! QANTAS needs to step up, the Adelaide market for international flights has grown drastically since they stopped flying international from adelaide back in 2013.

  • David

    says:

    Qantas have a problem with a lack of planes, and in particular spare planes. In the forseeable future, this situation isn’t going to change. So, they need to maximise route profitability.

    There is ongoing speculation on a number of new routes once the 787’s come on board, but they are also saying that some of these will be replacing 747’s. The 787’s are known to be fuel efficient, and Qantas will have eight on board by mid 2019.

    What they need to do, is up the order say to eight in 2018-19, and then say twelve in 2019-2020. This will give them a total of twelve by June 2019, and 24 by June 2020. This will give them a little bit of room to move to be able to return to ADL and PER, and open a few of the new routes to Europe and the Americas currently under speculation.

  • Graeme Hooper

    says:

    I just wish the domestic airlines would add further destinations to Newcastle like Adelaide, Darwin or Cairns and trans Tasman like Auckland or Queenstown in the winter. It has a major population catchment with the Hunter and Central Coast but certainly not the air services to serve 800,000 people.

  • Anil Kattula

    says:

    Qantas can surely find a 737 to do Adelaide – Auckland. They just don’t want to! Qantas are not interested in the smaller routes. They still have the 1960/70 mentality of services being all about prestige. They haven’t moved into the 21st century world of hub busting. Auckland and Singapore should be daily ex Adelaide!

  • Allan

    says:

    Tim, in addition to those you mentioned, Singapore, Cathay and Malaysia also offer direct flights from Adelaide.

  • D in Dhabi

    says:

    TO WHAT DEGREE IF ANY ARE ANY THESE SERVICES SUBSIDISED BY ADELAIDE AIRPORT AND/OR THE SA GOVERNMENT?

  • Matt

    says:

    International airlines flying in and out of Adelaide only fly from Adelaide to their hub, be it Singapore, Hong Kong, Auckland, Dubai, etc… Qantas’ hub is Sydney. Secondary point to point international services out of Adelaide are very rare and are only operated by low cost carriers to a couple of leisure destinations. This is market driven and a natural result of geographic and population factors. No one should fool themselves into believing that this is going to change all of a sudden. Airlines watch the numbers very closely and will only operate where services are economically viable and even then substantial gouvernment assistance is often needed to encourage them to do so.

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