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Summary

Travel restrictions due to the COVID-19 outbreak resulted in severe disruptions to domestic air travel this month.

There were 344.1 thousand passengers carried on Australian domestic commercial aviation (including charter operations) in April 2020, a decrease of 93.6 per cent on April 2019.

143.7 thousand passengers were carried on RPT flights in April 2020, a decrease of 97.2 per cent on April 2019.

RPT revenue passenger kilometres (RPKs) performed were 156.0 million for the month, down 97.4 per cent compared with April 2019.

Capacity, measured by available seat kilometres (ASKs), decreased by 92.6 per cent compared with April 2019 to a total of 554.6 million.

The industry wide load factor (RPKs/ASKs) decreased from 80.3 per cent in April 2019 to 28.1 per cent in April 2020.

For the month of April 2020, Melbourne–Sydney remained Australia's busiest RPT route with 17.1 thousand passengers, a decrease of 97.7 per cent compared with April 2019.

Brisbane was Australia's busiest domestic airport with 54.9 thousand passenger movements in April 2020 (down 96.2 per cent), followed by Sydney with 48.2 thousand passenger movements (down 97.9 per cent) and Melbourne with 42.2 thousand passenger movements (down 98.1 per cent).

Total cargo movements at Australian airports on domestic RPT flights were 25.5 thousand tonnes in April 2020, a decrease of 28.6 per cent compared with April 2019.

In April 2020, there were 89.2 thousand domestic passenger movements through regional airports, 95.8 per cent less than in April 2019.

Fixed-wing charter operators carried 200.4 thousand passengers in April 2020, a decrease of 9.6 per cent on April 2019. Perth Airport accounted for 37.8 per cent of all charter passengers in Australia.

Summary of annual RPT activity

*percentage point difference