Following a challenging first half in 2009, Singapore Changi Airport says it registered a strong rebound in the last quarter of the year, with a monthly record of 3.83 million passenger movements in December. This was an increase of 9.7% compared to December 2008 and 9.1% more than the previous record of 3.51 million set in December 2007.

Besides breaking the previous record for monthly traffic, December 2009 also saw a new record for the number of passenger movements in a day at Changi. This was set on the Saturday before Christmas Day (Dec 19 2009) with 140,000 passenger movements during the 24 hours.

As a result of the stronger performance in the last five months of the year, Changi Airport was able to achieve better-than-expected passenger traffic of 37.2 million for the whole of 2009. This was 1.3% less than the 37.7 million recorded in 2008.

Despite the impact of the global economic downturn, Changi handled more flights in 2009 – a total of 240,360, an increase of 3.6% compared to 2008. There were 21,885 flights in December 2009, an increase of 5.4% year-on-year.

On the cargo front, Changi processed 149,700 tonnes in December 2009, a 15.7% improvement year-on-year. Airfreight movement for the year amounted to 1.63 million tonnes, 12% lower than in 2008.