Spanish airports under the Aena network transported a total of 53.6 million passengers in the first quarter of the year, which is 41.6% more than in the same period recorded in 2022 and 1.6% more than in the first three months of 2019.
The Adolfo Suárez Madrid-Barajas airport recorded the highest number of passengers in the first three months of the year with 13.4 million passengers, which represents an increase of 47.2% compared to the same period in 2022 and practically equals the figures of 2019.
It is followed by the Josep Tarradellas Barcelona-El Prat airport, with 9.9 million passengers, 56.2% more than in 2022 and 5.1% below the pre-pandemic level and Málaga-Costa del Sol, with 3.7 million travelers, which is 8.7% above 2019 and 35.4% more than last year.
Regarding the number of operations registered so far this year, Aena airports have recorded a total of 491,344, which is 18.6% more than between January and March 2022 and 0.1% above 2019, being the Madrid Barajas Airport the one that carried out the most operations, with 89,539, 22.6% higher than in the period last year, but 8% below 2019.
In March 2023, 20 million passengers were recorded, thus exceeding the data for the same month of 2019 by 0.6%. This also represents an increase of 28.9% compared to March 2022.
Of the total number of travelers registered in March, almost all corresponded to commercial passengers. Of these, 12.8 million traveled on international flights, 1.6% less than in March 2019 and 30.6% more than in 2022, while 7.1 million did so on domestic flights, 4.4 % more than before the pandemic and 25.8% more than last year.
On the other hand, last month, 180,627 aircraft movements were carried on, which means exceeding the data for 2019 by 1.9% and those for 2022 by 18.2%. 96,566 tons of merchandise were also managed, 2.2% more than in the same month of 2019 and 4.6% more than in March 2022.
Barajas registered the highest number of passengers in the third month of the year, with 4.8 million, which represents a decrease of 1.7% compared to March 2019, but an increase of 35.5% compared to March last year.
They are followed by Spanish airports Barcelona-El Prat, with 3.7 million (-5.2% compared to 2019 and +39.3% compared to 2022); Malaga-Costa del Sol, with 1.4 million (+9% and +25.1%); Palma de Mallorca, with 1.3 million (+3.3% and +22.4%); Gran Canaria, with 1.2 million, (-1% and +22.1%); Tenerife Sur, with 1.1 million (+4.6% and +16.4%) and Alicante-Elche Miguel Hernández, with one million passengers, which represents an increase of 4.9% compared to the same month of 2019 and 25.8% more than the passengers reached in March 2022.