Edinburgh Airport operation copes well during busiest period in three years

Almost one million people travelled through Edinburgh Airport during April, marking the terminal’s busiest period since summer 2019.

A total of 931,522 passengers made their way through the airport as people took the opportunity to take their first trip the pandemic began, reunite with loved ones and enjoy a well-earned holiday.

It marks a significant improvement in the aviation sector as numbers rebounded strongly against the same months during the pandemic.

April 2022 passenger numbers

Domestic: 257,043

International: 674,479

Total: 931,522

April 2021 passenger numbers

Domestic: 24,889

International: 7,739

Total: 32,628

April 2020 passenger numbers

Domestic: 2,253

International: 3,192

Total: 5,445

April 2019 passenger numbers

Domestic: 468,364

International: 789,990

Total: 1,258,354

Edinburgh Airport had previously warned about the potential for queues due to the surge in demand and recruitment challenges, and passengers and staff worked together to help the operation go as smoothly as possible in almost all areas.

• 97.1% of passengers passed through security in under 15 minutes

• 90.3% of passengers passed through security in under 10 minutes

• More than 100 airport staff signing up to the Here To Help scheme which sees people from all areas of the business helping in security, check-in and other areas of the terminal during peak periods

• Increase in overtime rates and continuing onboarding of new recruits

Gordon Dewar, Chief Executive of Edinburgh Airport said:

“It was brilliant to welcome passengers back to the airport and see so many happy faces as people set off to reunite with family and friends, take long awaited honeymoons and family holidays or just enjoy some time to themselves - these big days have been missing for far too long.

“It was of course a challenging few weeks and we are quite happy with the way the airport operation performed as it saw its busiest period in almost three years. A big thank you must go to our workforce and others across the campus who welcomed and greeted that challenge with gusto, and to our passengers who worked with us to prepare for their trip and showed patience and understanding throughout.

“As ever there are lessons we can learn and improvements we can make as we head into the even busier summer season. We would like to remind passengers that we will face some challenges and again ask them to continue to work with us by planning ahead and ensuring they know what they need to do before they get here, and we will continue to do everything we can to get through the airport quickly and comfortably.”