(RTTNews) - Friday, Irish flag carrier Aer Lingus Group plc (AERL.L: News ) announced traffic statistics for the month of October 2009, reporting an almost 9% decline in air traffic and a 10.4% drop in capacity, reflecting a year-over-year reduction in long haul passengers.

For the month of October, traffic measured in terms of Revenue Passenger Kilometers decreased 8.9% to 1.32 billion from 1.45 billion in the past year. Traffic in short haul flights increased 5.9% to 885 million RPKs from 836 million RPKs, while in long haul flights, it slid 29.1% to 434 million RPKs from 612 million RPKs.

Available Seat Kilometers, which indicates total capacity, came down 10.4% to 1.77 billion from 1.97 billion. Short haul capacity for October rose 6.0% to 1.15 billion ASKs from 1.08 billion ASKs, while long haul capacity dropped 30.4% to 619 million ASKs from 890 million ASKs.

Total passenger numbers decreased 0.2% to 902 thousand from 904 thousand from the same month last year, reflecting a 25.7% year-over-year decline in long haul passengers. Short haul passengers, grew 3.3% to 821 thousand from October 2008.
Aer Lingus recorded overall load factor of 74.6% for the month, representing a 1.3 percentage points increase from 73.3% in the previous year. Short haul load factor dipped 0.1 percentage points to 77.0%. The monthly load factor for Long haul was 70.1%, up 1.3 percentage points from a year earlier.

For the year-to-date period, traffic decreased 3.5% to 13.92 billion RPKs from 14.42 billion RPKs, and capacity reduced 5.2% to 18.22 billion ASKs from 19.22 billion ASKs in 2008. Passenger load factor climbed 1.4 percentage points year-over-year to 76.4% from 75.0%.

AERL.L is currently trading at €0.54 , down €0.01 or 1.82%, on the LSE.

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by RTT Staff Writer

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