Dubai Airport has taken over as the world’s third ranked airport for international passenger numbers, vaulting ahead of Hong Kong International Airport in the global ranking, the company managing Dubai airport announced today. London Heathrow and Paris Charles De Gaulle airports top the list of busiest airports for international traffic.
According to the annual traffic report issued today by Dubai Airports, passenger traffic surged 13.2 per cent to 57.68 million in 2012, up from 50.97million passengers recorded during 2011. In contrast, India's busiest airports Delhi and Mumbai handled 34 and 30 million passengers respectively in 2012.
India remained Dubai International’s single biggest country destination in terms of passenger numbers. The passenger traffic between Dubai and India continued to show robust growth during the past year, with total passenger traffic rising 7.4% year on year to 7.34 million passengers in 2012. Traffic was bolstered by the introduction of SpiceJet which added new flights from Delhi, Mumbai, Kochi and Ahmedabad to Dubai. Air India Express, Indigo and Emirates also added new flights and destinations during the year, Dubai airports said.
Mumbai and Delhi feature amongst the top ten busiest routes from the Gulf emirate.
