During the ACI General Assembly in Brussels Eammon Brennan, the director of Eurocontrol brought forward the capacity concerns the European aviation will face in 2018 and the future which might see more passengers grounded in the future.
He underlined that in the first five months of 2018 there had been higher delays than in recent times, the traffic increased by 3.4 percent but the en-route Air Traffic Flow Management rose dramatically from 0.46 per flight.
Disruptive events like air strikes caused 28 percent delays and 27 percent was because of weather. Staffing, capacity issues contributed 55 percent mainly in Germany, France and Low Countries. Brennan stated that Europe is already struggling to cope with the levels of traffic this year, there might be a growth of 1.9 percent a year between now and 2040, this implies 16.2 million flights a year.
Under the highest growth scenario it might reach 19.5 million flights. In 2040 considering the most likely scenario there might not be enough capacity for approximately 1.5 million flights or 160 million passengers.
The report is essential for policy makers for the long term forecast, also the long term predictions will provide sufficient time to address the issue and provide more capacity and the issue needs to be addressed urgently. The United Kingdom, Turkey, France and Germany will have more than three thousand additional flights per day.
Even though the top 20 airports will be expanding their capacities, it will not be enough. Chances are high that out of the 1.5 million flights -160 million passengers will not be able to fly by 2040 and many airports will become busier with higher delays.
According to the report 16 airports will get highly congested by 2040, resulting a congestion in the passenger numbers by one or two hour which will lead to the growth from 50,00 each day to around 470,000 a day in 2040 in 2040.
The publication of Eurocontrol’s latest Challenges of Growth study was announced at the event by Brennan which will address the issue of European aviation will face by 2040.
