Monthly passengers increased by 16.9%, the largest monthly increase in over 10 years, as more than 1.8 million passengers flew through Stansted in October, over 272,000 more than used the airport in the corresponding month last year.
October’s performance signals the start of one of Stansted’s busiest winter seasons for many years and is in addition to the announcement yesterday that Flybe, Europe’s largest regional airline, will launch new flights to the Isle of Man, Newcastle and Newquay from March 2015.
The growth in passengers continues to be driven by increased frequencies on key routes across Europe plus an increase in the average number of seats sold on each aircraft – up from 81.6% in 2013 to 85.2% in October 2014.
Andrew Harrison, Stansted’s Managing Director, said:
"The strong growth we’ve seen at Stansted across the summer months has continued through to October with annual passenger numbers increasing at their fastest rate for nearly 10 years to maintain our leading position as the fastest growing airport in the south-east.
"To grow our monthly passenger numbers by 16.9% demonstrates the strength of our route network and the success of our airline partners in attracting more and more passengers on to each flight as load factors continue their upward trend.
"Stansted has now seen over 1.7 million more passengers use the airport in the last 12 months, and with one of our busiest winter flight schedules for many years now in operation, we expect to see passenger numbers continuing to grow in the coming months.
"This increasing demand underpins why we believe it’s critical Network Rail’s Anglia Route Study proposals need to show more ambition and greater vision to deliver faster rail services to unlock the airport’s potential as, unlike other London airports, Stansted has spare runway capacity today and significant room to grow in the future."