Trolley Photo Album Above
PHUKET'S international air traffic continues its steep incline to previously unreached giddy heights, with October showing a surge of 55.97 percent in overseas arrivals and departures.
Official Phuket airport statistics show a total of 5.7 million visitors have caught flights or disembarked on arrival on the island so far up to November this year.
By our reckoning, this would mean the once-keenly-sought six millionth arrival or departure should be arriving (or departing) any day now.
And the beat goes on, with November and December likely to take the total to seven million or beyond.
Debate will continue about precisely where these visitors go once they get here, and how much they spend on Phuket, but no serious doubts are held about the accuracy of the figures. They simply reflect the click rate of the airport turnstiles.
In October, 270,428 overseas travellers passed through Phuket airport, taking the total number to 595,052, an overall increase of 21.82 percent year-on-year.
One paradox is that domestic Phuket traffic has remained grounded while foreign traffic has been taking off. Domestic arrivals and departures in October totalled 324,624, a rise of a mere 3.03 percent.
International flight numbers were up by 39.50 percent to 1879 arrivals and departures, with the total Phuket flights for the month of October at 4090 and 31,206 for the year to November.
It is not so much a mystery as one may think. Check for example the overseas price to fly to Bangkok with the the price to fly to Phuket. E.g. it is much cheaper to fly to Bangkok with Airberlin then to Phuket.
So Bangkok is not so hot anymore (one ask why...) and/or has excess capacity. So more flights to Phuket, same or less to Bangkok, with less connecting flights to Phuket. Also all the new direct flights from se asisa and arab countries. Bypassing Bangkok.
That the domestic flights still grows, just show you, that inner Thai air travel takes off also. Anecdotal evidence: a lot of my Thai friends now fly to Bangkok or Chang Mai for the weekend. Something they never did only five years ago. They then took the bus.
Good sign for Thailand. They grow richer and less dependent on foreign tourists. Ask the Baht.
Posted by Lena on November 8, 2010 12:56