WIZZ AIR saw the benefit of Easter getaways as passenger numbers climbed steadily in March, continuing a strong trend for the airline and the aviation sector in general.

The firm said it carried 4,778,980 passengers in the month, 12 per cent higher than in the same month last year.

Despite this, the airline's load factor - the percentage of available seating capacity that has been filled with passengers - actually decreased by 1.3 percentage points, as capacity for the airline rose by 13.6 per cent in January.

"March traffic at Wizz Air was a bit weaker than we expected, impacted by a higher level of one directional visiting friends and relatives (VFR) journeys during the Easter period that depressed the load factor slightly," analysts at Peel

Hunt said.

Over the past year, Wizz Air has carried over 62m passengers - a 21 per cent increase on last year.

Wizz Air's total emissions were also up significantly compared to the year before. In March, CO2 emissions rose 12 per cent to 442,368 tonnes. Across the year as a whole, CO2 emissions jumped 22.5 per cent to 5.7m tonnes.

Shares closed up 2.08 per cent.

(c) 2024 City A.M., source Newspaper