Turkish Airlines carries 64 million passengers in January-September

ISTANBUL

The number of passengers Turkish Airlines carried in the first nine months of 2023 increased by 18.6 percent from a year ago to 63.9 million.

The passenger load factor improved from 79.7 percent to 83.1 percent, the national flag carrier said in a filing with the stock exchange.

The international passenger tally rose nearly 17 percent year-on-year to 40.35 million, while domestic passengers grew 22 percent to 23.6 million between January-September.

In September alone, the number of total passengers the company served rose by 9.2 percent from the same month of last year to 7.9 million, with international passengers up 2.9 percent to more than 5 million.

Turkish Airlines increased its seat capacity from 78,909 in September 2022 to 87,946 last month, while the number of destinations the carries flies to rose from 335 to 339.

The number of passengers it carried from the Far East leaped 41 percent year-on-year to 4.8 million in the first nine months of 2023. The increase was 13 percent for the European routes to 19.4 million. Turkish Airlines carried 2.9 million passengers from North America, pointing to a 11 percent increase from a year ago.

The company expanded its fleet by 10 percent to have a total of 429 jets as of September.

Earlier this month, Turkish Airlines said that in line with its growth targets, it decided to purchase a total of 10 A350-900 aircraft from Airbus to be delivered in 2025, 2026 and 2027.