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Singapore’s Changi is this year’s busiest Asia Pacific airport with 7.3 million international passengers handled, according to Sobie Aviation
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Hong Kong International Airport lost its grip and fell from the top 10 along with other Greater China airports as they struggled to contain the pandemic
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Manila’s Ninoy Aquino International Airport climbed to No. 6 after reopening its borders
Singapore’s Changi Airport is Asia’s top airport so far this year in terms of international passenger traffic, according to Sobie Aviation, an independent aviation and aerospace consulting firm.
Hong Kong International Airport, the busiest hub in Asia Pacific before the pandemic, has been literally toppled by COVID-19 off the top of the ladder in the second quarter of 2022.
Changi handled 7.3 million international passengers as of June 30, a recovery rate of 44%.
Tied at No. 2 spot with 3.2 million international passengers each were Indira Gandhi International Airport and Bangkok’s Suvarnabhumi Airport. Their recovery rates were 75% and 26%.
Rounding out the top 5 were Seoul Incheon Airport with 2.9 million (16% recovery rate) and Kuala Lumpur International Airport with 2.6 million (24%).
The Philippines’ Ninoy Aquino International Airport is sixth among the region’s top 10 with 2.4 million international passengers (39.7% recovery rate), its first and only positive top rating ever that came after being ranked as the worst airport for business travel in May.
In seventh place is Mumbai Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj which handled 2.2 million passengers (71%); in eighth Dhaka Shahjalal with 2 million (115%); and in ninth Sydney Kingsford Smith with 1.8 million (45%).
Tokyo Narita tied Sydney with 1.8 million (20%) to remain in the top 10.
Delhi Indira Gandhi International Airport, Mumbai Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj Airport, Dhaka Shahjalal Airport, and Sydney Kingsford Smith Airport are surprise top entrants in the international passenger traffic-based rankings.
Absent from the top 10 this time around are Taiwan Taoyuan, No. 5 in Q1 2019; Shanghai Pudong Airport, previously No. 7; Beijing Capital Airport, formerly No. 9, and Osaka Kansai Airport, No. 10.
Hong Kong International Airport fell out of the top 10 “to approximately No.30,” with 591,000 passengers, or a 3% recovery rate.
“The gap between Hong Kong and other international hub airports will continue to widen until Hong Kong fully opens and eliminates all quarantine and testing requirements,” Brendan Sobie, who established Sobie Aviation, said adding that recent measures to ease some requirements “will not move the needle significantly.”
“For example, the recovery rate for Singapore will likely reach 70% by the end of the year while Hong Kong may only reach 10% based on the current requirements ,” Sobie, previously the chief analyst at CAPA–Center for Aviation, noted.
The former British colony is currently fighting the fifth and what could be the worst wave of the pandemic. Since COVID-19 struck in Hong Kong in late January 2020, the cumulative number of infections had risen to 864,771 and the death toll to 9,620 as of August 25, 2022.
On August 24, health authorities reported a daily tally of 7,884 new cases and 14 deaths, the highest figures since the 8,037 cases on March 27 before the fifth wave waned. Hong Kong’s Centre for Health Protection warned the daily tally could rise to 10,000 soon.
The irony is, travellers arriving from some of the countries that lifted their anti-pandemic guard brought the highly contagious Omicron subvariants into Hong Kong.
