Commercial flights in EU show signs of recovery

By Gokhan Ergocun

ISTANBUL (AA) - The EU's statistical authority announced on Tuesday that the 27-member bloc's commercial flight activities posted positive signs after a tough year due to the pandemic measures.

Eurostat said that the number of commercial flights in the union increased by 48% year-on-year in August – but this is still well below the pre-pandemic levels – 31% lower than August 2019.

"To prevent the spread of the COVID-19 pandemic, countries around the world have taken a variety of restrictive measures since the beginning of 2020," it noted.

In this August, the number of commercial flights stood at 479,000 versus 325,000 in August 2020 and 696,000 in August 2019.

Compared to August 2019, Greece, Romania and Croatia posted lowest declines in commercial flights with 7%, 18% and 22%, respectively, while Finland (60%), Ireland (55%) and Slovenia (54%) saw the largest declines.