Busy June Continues Upward Trend for European Ops
Business aircraft flights have now increased for eight consecutive months.

Business aircraft operations in Europe in June marked their busiest month so far in 2017, capping off eight straight months of year-over-year growth, according to data from the European Business Aviation Association (EBAA) and WingX Advance.


The last time Europe saw eight months of traffic growth was in 2010, EBAA said.


“Business aviation movements in Europe once again showed a healthy year-on-year increase this past month,” said Brandon Mitchener, EBAA CEO, citing data provided by Eurocontrol. “What is more, with 6.2 percent year-on-year [overall flight operations] growth for the January-June 2017 period, this is the strongest showing for this period in a decade.”


June marked 84,000 business aircraft departures in Europe, a 2.7 percent year-over-year increase, according to WingX. Despite this jump, WingX pointed out that this is still 4.5 percent down from a decade ago.


Germany, Spain, Italy and the UK all experienced traffic growth. Flights in Southern Europe were up 12 percent year-over-year in June. WingX Advance attributed some of this growth to an increase in activity at popular resorts and said charter demand is driving the activity growth.


But France, which is Europe’s busiest market, experienced a 6 percent drop in business aviation activity, WingX said, citing an unusually high level of activity during last summer’s Euro football championships.


Transatlantic arrivals in Europe increased 12 percent in June, spurred in part by a 14 percent jump from Asia.


“[June marked] another solid growth month for business aviation activity in Europe despite the absence of the Euro football championship finals, which boosted activity last year,” said Richard Koe, managing director of WingX Advance. “The signs are that summer 2017 could be a hot one for the European charter market.”