China's civil aviation sector maintained safe and stable operation in the first three quarters of this year, with steady growth in both passenger and cargo transportation volumes, according to the Civil Aviation Administration of China (CAAC).
In the first nine months of the year, airlines nationwide logged 122.03 billion tonne-kilometers of transport turnover, handled 580 million passenger trips, and carried 7.395 million tonnes of cargo and mail, up 10.3 percent, 5.2 percent and 14.0 percent year on year, respectively.
A total of 4.88 million flights of all types were safely operated in the first nine months, an average of 18,000 flights per day, a year-on-year increase of five percent. Meanwhile, the flight regularity rate was 89.7 percent, an increase of 5.2 percentage points over the same period of the previous year.
In the third quarter alone, overall aviation operation maintained rapid growth, with airlines nationwide logging 43.68 billion tonne-kilometers of transport turnover, a year-on-year increase of 12.4 percent.
In the July-September period, civil aviation passenger traffic maintained steady growth, with a total of 210 million passenger trips handled, a year-on-year increase of 3.9 percent. During the summer peak travel season, the number of monthly passenger trips exceeded 70 million for consecutive months, including over 7 million international passenger trips, both reaching record monthly highs.
Civil aviation cargo demand remains strong in the past three months. Airlines nationwide handled 2.611 million tonnes of cargo and mail transport, a year-on-year increase of 12.8 percent. In the three-month period, international cargo traffic maintained double-digit growth year on year.
China's civil aviation industry maintains steady growth in January-September
