Ryanair sees largest decline in passenger numbers in 6 months due to Omicron restrictions

Budget airline Ryanair has seen the number of passengers flown drop by 7% between November and December as travel restrictions were imposed across Europe amid the spread of the Omicron variant.

The carrier said the number of passengers dropped to 9.5 million last month – the lowest since July and down from 10.2 million in November.

It ran 62,200 flights last month, with a load factor – a measure of how well an airline fills its planes – of 81%, down from 86% in November. 

The group had warned over profits just before Christmas as it cut its passenger forecast for December and January due to Omicron restrictions. 

The group had previously expected to fly between 10 and 11 million passengers in December, while it also slashed its guidance for January by 33% as restrictions were imposed on British passengers flying to Germany and France and all EU passengers to Morocco.

It slashed its full-year results guidance to a net loss of between 250 million euros (£209 million) to 450 million euros (£375 million) from a previous net loss range of between 100 million euros (£83 million) to 200 million euros (£167 million). 

On a year-on-year basis, Ryanair saw passenger numbers rise from 1.9 million in December 2020, when there were strict restrictions to control last winter’s wave of the pandemic. 

A recent Eurocontrol report on how the Covid pandemic has affected the aviation industry under its remit revealed Ireland, the UK and Finland suffered the highest percentage of air traffic loss in 2021. 

The report noted Ireland was overall the worst affected with a traffic loss of 62% (or 183,000 flights) due to its "critical reliance" on flights to and from the UK.