July 15, 2016: Munich Airport recorded growth in the air cargo business in the first half of 2016 and it was even more robust than in the passenger segment.

The total of about 163,000 tonnes of flown airfreight represented a 4 percent year-on-year gain over the same period a year earlier.

Gains were posted in all traffic segments in the first half of 2016: The nearly 20 million passengers in the first six months of the year represent yet another record. This was a 2.3 percent gain over the same period a year earlier.

"For the entire calendar year, we therefore expect a 4 percent increase in take-offs and landings," said Michael Kerkloh, CEO, Munich Airport.

The number of passengers on intercontinental flights increased 4.3 percent to 3.2 million in the first half of 2016.

This largely reflects the new long-haul destinations offered in the current summer timetable: Lufthansa launched new connections to Denver and Tehran, Delta Airlines now offers a non-stop service to Detroit, Saudia is flying from Munich to Riyadh and Condor has added Windhoek, in Namibia, to its route map.

In continental traffic, the airport handled a total of 11.9 million passengers in the first half, or 2.5 percent more than a year earlier.

The biggest factor in the growth in European traffic was the launch of numerous new services by Transavia. The Dutch-French carrier has stationed four aircraft in Munich to operate around 100 flights per week to 19 destinations in nine European countries.

Lufthansa now offers flights to Debrecen, Corfu, Odessa, Porto, Rzeszów and Santorini. The British regional carrier bmi is serving five destinations from Munich: adding three new destinations - Brno, Milan/Bergamo, Norrköping, Rostock and Southampton.

Domestic traffic, at 4.7 million passengers, was down slightly in the first half as compared with 2015.

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