OREANDA-NEWS. August 21, 2012. Cathay Pacific Airways today released combined Cathay Pacific and Dragonair traffic figures for July 2012 that show a small decline in the number of passengers carried, while another sizeable year-on-year drop in cargo and mail tonnage was recorded.

Cathay Pacific and Dragonair carried a total of 2,505,738 passengers in July – down 0.7% on the same month in 2011 – while the passenger load factor dropped by 5.0 percentage points to 81.1%. Capacity for the month, measured in available seat kilometres (ASKs), rose by 2.3%. For the year to date, passenger numbers have risen by 7.1% compared to a capacity increase of 6.2%.

The two airlines carried 125,343 tonnes of cargo and mail last month, a drop of 10.5% compared to July 2011. The cargo and mail load factor was down by 1.9 percentage points to 64.7%. Capacity, measured in available cargo/mail tonne kilometres, decreased by 11.4%, while cargo and mail tonne kilometres flown dropped by 14.0%. For the year to date, tonnage has declined by 9.9% against a capacity drop of 5.4%.

Cathay Pacific General Manager Revenue Management James Tong said: “The drop in passenger numbers was partly attributable to Severe Typhoon Vicente, which had a significant impact on our operations towards the end of July. While leisure demand was generally robust in the first full month of the summer peak, premium traffic volumes showed a decline. Yield remained under pressure in all classes of travel.”

Cathay Pacific General Manager Cargo Sales & Marketing James Woodrow said: “There was little change in the situation seen in previous months, with continued soft demand out of our two main markets, Hong Kong and Mainland China. We don’t anticipate that situation to change in August, so our strategy will be to continue to pare back capacity in line with demand. Our sixth Boeing 747-8 Freighter arrived in July and is helping to boost the operating economics on key long-haul routes. Two more of the aircraft will arrive before the end of 2012.”