Sydney Airport experienced flat passenger numbers in February, as an improvement in international travellers was offset by fewer people flying domesticly.
The airport handled 3.284 million passengers in February, compared with 3.287 million in February 2016, with the comparison with the prior year was affected by February 2016 being in a leap year.
International passengers rose 4.2 per cent to 1.222 million, while the number of domestic travellers fell 2.5 per cent to 2.062 million.
Sydney Airport chief executive Kerrie Mather described international passenger numbers as “robust” and attributed the decline in domestic travellers to the “leap year effect”.
“Domestic and international load factors continued to remain stable compared to the [prior corresponding period],” Mather said in a statement on Monday.
It was a similar story at Brisbane Airport, which reported an overall 1.7 per cent decline in passenger numbers to 1.64 million in February. International passengers was up 3.9 per cent to 410,565, while domestic numbers were down 3.7 per cent to 1.225 million.
