OREANDA-NEWS. Heathrow handled 72.3m passengers over 2013, an increase of 3.4% on 2012.

Taking account the dip in demand from the Olympic Games, underlying growth is estimated at 2.3%

Seats per aircraft increased 2.8% on 2012 and the average load factor was 76.4%, up 1 percentage point. Passengers per aircraft rose 3.7% to 154.8.

European traffic in 2013 grew 4.4%, in part a 'bounce back' from the Olympics and also benefitting from the integration of bmi into British Airways' network.

BRIC passengers were up 6.9% over the year, with China up 18.9%, and India up 8.7%.

December results:

5.8 million passengers passed through Heathrow in December 2013, up 2.8% on the previous year.

Seats per aircraft increased 2.6% and load factors were up 1.3 percentage points on last year, to 76.7%. Passengers per aircraft increased 5.2% to 158.9.

BRIC passengers were up by 6.1% overall, with China up 18.6%, India up 6.7% and Brazil up 4.4%.

Heathrow CEO Colin Matthews said:

“During 2013 Heathrow was named the best large airport in Europe, T5 was voted the 'world's best terminal' for the second year running and we welcomed the Airports Commission's shortlisting of Heathrow as an option for expansion. Our passenger figures reflect the growing demand for the long-haul destinations only a hub airport can support. Yet Heathrow is full, leaving European hubs to add destinations whilst we look on. We are not against expansion at Gatwick, but greater point to point capacity is no substitute for new hub capacity which only Heathrow can provide.”