Freight travelling through London’s Heathrow Airport, the UK’s largest gateway, increased by 13% to 139,000 tonnes last month, marking the 13th consecutive record month for volumes at Europe’s 4th largest airfreight facility. For the year to date volumes, Heathrow has seen a 10.3% rise for the first eight months of this year to just over 1.1m tonnes.
London Stansted Airport saw a 1.4% rise in August volumes to 20,500 tonnes, and the annual total increased by 4.0% over the previous 12 month period to more than 259,400 tonnes. East Midlands airport increased by 11.3% to 29,200 tonnes. Both are owned by the MAG airports group. The UK Northern airport of Manchester, also owned by MAG, saw airfreight volumes gain in August, with an increase of 22% to 12,027 tonnes. London-Gatwick saw its cargo volumes in August rise significantly, by 25.6% to just over 8,000 tonnes.
Latin America was Heathrow’s fastest growing trading market with airfreight volumes increasing 30% in August. Chief Executive at Heathrow, John Holland-Kaye, commented: “North America also performed well with volumes up 13% to nearly 50,000 tonnes as American Airlines, United and Air Canada increased cargo. Strong growth to China, Hong Kong and Singapore also helped East Asia record a 12% cargo uplift. Demand to travel from Heathrow has never been stronger ─ every day we’re welcoming record numbers of passengers to Heathrow with modern British hospitality and our trade with the rest of the world is growing in the double-digits. Heathrow is firing on all cylinders and showing the world our country is open for business.”
