Flight prices in Europe have soared at nearly six times the rate of consumer inflation - but that hasn't put holiday-starved families off from booking.
A new study from ACI Europe has shown that passenger numbers are getting closer to pre-pandemic levels, with the likes of Iceland, Cyprus, Greece, Portugal, Bulgaria and Malta seeing some of the best results.
However, the aviation industry isn't fully out of the woods, as Mr Jankovec added that "only 47% of Europe’s airports having fully recovered their pre-pandemic passenger volumes".
Olivier Jankovec, Director General of ACI EUROPE said: "April has brought us closest ever to a full recovery for passenger traffic. The Easter holidays boosted demand, which clearly kept defying inflationary pressures. This is quite remarkable when the increase in air fares is more than 6 times above consumer price inflation."
The consumer price inflation rate in the eurozone stood at +6% in May 2023, whereas air fares in Europe for the same month were running at +36%.
It comes after a number of travel giants have warned that the era of cheap flights could be over.
Earlier this year, TUI's CEO warned that people should not hold out hope for last-minute bargains. TUI Chief executive Sebastian Ebel said the company was seeing exceptionally high demand in the first full summer since the end of the pandemic as people remain desperate to get away.
Unlike previous years when unsold holidays would be advertised for bargain prices shortly before departure, the high demand means few are likely to be up for grabs.
Last summer, a number of UK airports and airlines struggled to cope with the surge of demand post-pandemic, which left Brits facing chaotic queues and delays - some which lasted hours.
Ahead of the Easter holidays back in April, one travel expert warned Brits to prepare themselves for some more disruption over the peak holiday seasons, saying that "airports and airlines simply do not have enough time to adequately prepare for another peak season".
He explained: "The concern for many holiday-goers this year is that air travel could be reaching, or perhaps exceeding, 2019 levels. Yet there have been few indications of disruption levels improving.
"We can see from summer 2021 - a year where travel was limited - that when travel demand is manageable for airports and airlines, disruptions occur far less. Of the 9.9 million air passengers that travelled in 2021, 8.9 million departed on time and only 60,000 were delayed more than two hours."
Passengers heading to Heathrow Airport this summer may be hit with disruption as over 2,000 security officers are due to strike across 31 days in June, July and August.
Unite the Union announced the swathe of industrial action beginning in just a few weeks time, on Saturday 24 June.
Unite general secretary Sharon Graham said: “Unite is putting Heathrow on notice that strike action at the airport will continue until it makes a fair pay offer to its workers. Make no mistake, our members will receive the union’s unflinching support in this dispute.
“HAL has got its priorities all wrong. This is an incredibly wealthy company, which this summer is anticipating bumper profits and an executive pay bonanza. It’s also expected to pay out huge dividends to shareholders, yet its workers can barely make ends meet and are paid far less than workers at other airports.”
But Heathrow airport sort to reassure passengers they will try and minimise the impact of strikes so Brits can still enjoy their holidays.
A Heathrow spokesperson said: “Passengers can rest assured that we will do everything we can to minimise strike disruption so they can enjoy their hard-earned summer holidays. Unite has already tried and failed to disrupt the airport with unnecessary strikes on some of our busiest days and we continue to build our plans to protect journeys during any future action.
“The simple fact remains that the majority of colleagues do not support Unite’s strikes. There is a two-year inflation-beating pay rise ready for colleagues, if only Unite would allow them to have a say. We will continue talks with Unite about resolving this issue.”
You can find out more on aci-europe.org.
