Lower Passenger Traffic at Burgas Airport in Jan-Feb
The number of passengers serviced at the Burgas airport, on Bulgaria's southern Black Sea coast, dropped by 47.4% on the year to 20,913 in the first two months of 2013, its concessionaire, German company Fraport, reported.
The other airport in Bulgaria which Fraport manages, Varna airport, handled 33,556 passengers through February, Fraport said in a statement. The Varna airport, on the northern Black Sea coast, was closed for reconstruction in February last year.
Cargo traffic via the Burgas airport reached 918 tonnes in the January-February period compared with only 63 tonnes in the same period last year, while at the Varna airport cargo traffic amounted to 3.0 tonnes.
Aircraft movements at the Varna airport through February were 564 compared with 20 a year earlier, while at the Burgas airport they declined by an annual 50.6% to 415.
In February alone, Fraport serviced 9,499 passengers at the Burgas airport, down 49.2% on the year, and handled 16,475 passengers at the Varna airport.
The two airports are the main gateways to the Bulgarian coastal resorts for millions of foreign tourists.
In 2006, Fraport Twin Star Airport Management, a 60/40 joint venture of Fraport and Bulgarian company BM Star, won a 35-year concession to manage the airports in Burgas and Varna.