Samarkand International Airport (SKD) is the second fastest growing airport in Europe and Central Asia in the final 5 years and has simply recorded its twenty second consecutive month-to-month enhance in passenger numbers.
New information launched by the European airport trade organisation ACI Europe, present that SKD has grown passenger volumes by 191.6%% since the equal pre-Covid pandemic figures of 2019. This represents the second largest progress of any airport measured by ACI Europe, which represents over 500 airports in 55 international locations. This was manner forward of the 9% common progress recorded between 2019-2024 throughout its airports in European / Central Asia, based on ACI Europe, whose airports stretch throughout Europe plus Albania, Armenia, Belarus, Bosnia & Herzegovina, Georgia, Israel, Kazakhstan, Kosovo, North Macedonia, Moldova, Montenegro, Russia, Serbia, Turkey, Ukraine and Uzbekistan.
SKD has additionally revealed that July was its twenty second consecutive month of progress since October 2022, as volumes grew to 121,157 for the month, from 80,539 in 2023. This got here after a report 647,085 passengers handed by way of the airport in the first six months of the 12 months, up by 47% on the 2023 determine, with an extra 207,421 passengers utilizing the new airport facility that acts as a gateway to Uzbekistan’s historic and fast-growing metropolis in the coronary heart of the well-known Silk Road. Average progress throughout the wider European area was simply 5.8% in H1 when in comparison with 2023, says ACI Europe.
Dmitry Martynenko, Commercial Director of Air Marakanda, says: “We have now achieved 22 consecutive months of passenger growth, driven by demand for domestic and international travel from Samarkand and the surrounding area, and by overseas carriers increasing the number of visitors to our incredible ancient city of Samarkand. Air Marakanda will continue to grow the route network and passenger numbers at Samarkand International Airport over the summer and for the remainder of 2024, as airlines increase capacity and open new city connections with Samarkand.”
Martynenko defined: “The Government’s positive open-skies policies, our historic city of Samarkand and our state-of-the-art airport and other tourism facilities, continue to drive passenger growth at Samarkand International Airport. There is much more to come, as overseas visitors recognise the potential of Samarkand. This is a city that now mixes ancient architecture recognised by the UNESCO World Heritage List, with key modern investments including the Silk Road Samarkand tourist centre and other 21st century infrastructure. We are at the beginning of work to attract more visitors to Samarkand, our surrounding region and the wider Uzbekistan, as tourism helps to build new revenue growth in our economy.”
Samarkand airport administration firm Air Marakanda has pushed a doubling of passenger numbers in every of the previous two years, with a couple of million passengers utilizing the new, state-of-the-art airport terminal for a primary time in 2023. The complete of 1,010,938 passengers beat the 2022 report, of 517,521, by 104.9% and this progress exhibits no signal of slowing.
According to information from ACI Europe, SKD is second-only, in phrases of progress, to the Albanian capital of Tirana amongst medium-size airports since 2019. It elevated passenger volumes by 239.3%, whereas in distinction Babimost in western Poland led the small airport part by growing 176.4%. Istanbul recorded an 18.1% enhance to guide the ‘Majors’ airport part, Athens was the fastest growing ‘Mega’ airport with 24.5% extra passengers and Sochi, up by 90.8%, was the quickest growing ‘Large’ airport.
Samarkand International Airport is classed in the ‘Medium’ dimension class – for airports with between one-10 million annual passenger numbers – and is now ranked amongst the high 10 regional airport leaders in the Central Asian area by the World Airport Awards (SKYTRAX) worldwide airport score.
Passenger volumes at SKD are set to develop following the launch of Air Samarkand, the first service to base itself at the airport. Alongside an in depth constitution flight programme, Air Samarkand commenced scheduled companies to Istanbul in March, and final week started twice-weekly return companies to Jeddah in Saudi Arabia to help spiritual pilgrims heading to the holy cities of Mecca and Medina. Air Samarkand is additionally working companies to Sharm El Sheikh in Egypt and Nha Trang in Vietnam utilizing Airbus A321neo and A330-300 plane.
The airport not too long ago welcomed Chinese low-cost service Loong Air, which started working flights from Samarkand airport to Xi’an (China).
Further worldwide passenger site visitors progress has been pushed from the cities of Abu Dhabi, Dubai, Istanbul, Moscow and St. Petersburg, which collectively delivered 612,963 passengers, equal to a rise of 56% over 2023.
Since the starting of 2024, Samarkand International Airport’s route community has expanded to 24 home and worldwide routes. Of these, Turkistan, Tyumen, Irkutsk, Nizhny Novgorod and Xi’an had been different new locations to be added.