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Photo: Reuters
An El Al plane at Ben Gurion Airport
Photo: Reuters

Record numbers flood Ben Gurion Airport in 2016

Over 17 million travelers passed through Ben Gurion Airport last year, an 11% rise over 2015; the most popular destinations were Turkey, the US, Germany, Italy, Russia and France.

17,387,971 international travelers passed through Ben Gurion Airport in 2016, according to data released Sunday by the Israel Airports Authority. The numbers represent an 11 percent rise over 2015.

 

 

Including domestic travel, more than 18 million people utilized the country’s main airport last year.

 

Leading destinations for travel to and from Israel included Turkey (1.6 passengers, most of whom were in transit), the United States (1.45 million), Germany (1.2 million), Italy (1.5 million). One million passengers travelled to both Russia and France.

 

Terminal 3 at Ben-Gurion Airport (Photo: Shutterstock)
Terminal 3 at Ben-Gurion Airport (Photo: Shutterstock)

 

Top airlines included Israel's national carrier El Al (5.5 million passengers), Turkish Airlines (932,000), easyJet (719,000), Aeroflot (704,000), Arkia (650,000) and Israir (548,000).

 

Currently, more than 100 airlines fly out of Israel to 135 international destinations – numbers that are unusual for an airport of Ben Gurion’s size.

 

But spokespeople for the Airports Authority said that infrastructure and security work at the airport would allow Israel to further expand air travel in and out of the country and to accommodate additional airlines wanting to expand their services to include Israel.

 

Thirty-six percent of travelers check in for flights online from home, and nine percent use kiosks in the departures hall. Ninety percent of passengers on low-cost airlines checked in online and printed boarding passes at home.

 

Uvda International Airport, near Eilat, registered 128,595 travellers during 2016, a 97.8 percent spike over 2015.

 

“We are entering the fifth year of the 'Open Skies' agreement with the European Union…. In contrast to all the predictions, Israeli citizizens have benefitted from the agreement, and Israeli airlines have not suffered losses," Transportation Minister Yisrael Katz said. "On the contrary, they have added flights to many international destinations.”

 

Reprinted with permission from TPS.

 


פרסום ראשון: 01.01.17, 15:41
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