Passenger growth supported by strong business and tourism activity

Strong international growth with increased passengers to Dili and Bali

Northern Territory Airports is pleased to announce strong passenger growth for both Darwin International Airport and Alice Springs Airport during the 2009/2010 financial year.

Domestic passenger numbers through Darwin Airport were up 5.7% and Alice Springs Airport 3.3% respectively on the prior year.

The international market also grew solidly for Darwin Airport, up 12.3% on the previous year. Several carriers either commenced on increased capacity on sectors to Darwin during the 2009/2010 financial year:

Darwin-based regional carrier Airnorth commenced services to the Gold Coast via Mount Isa and recently launched services to Karratha and Port Hedland;

Virgin Blue has increased Melbourne services to daily, and now also operates a direct service to Perth;

Qantas added capacity with new Canberra services commencing in February 2010, and Jetstar increased its Sydney-Darwin flights;

Tiger Airways resuming Melbourne-Darwin services in June 2010.

Alice Springs Airport also benefited from stronger loads on key Qantas sectors and 10 months of Tiger Airways’ Adelaide services. Further growth opportunities are anticipated for Alice Springs in coming years.

Northern Territory Airports CEO Mr Ian Kew said "It is very pleasing to see such strong growth in passenger numbers during such a challenging economic environment.”

“The growth in transfer traffic presents a particularly exciting opportunity for Darwin to capture more stopover traffic. We will continue to work with Tourism NT to encourage these passengers transiting from southern Australian capital cities to South East Asian destinations to spend a few days in our city, to the benefit of the broader local economy” he said.

“We remain focussed on our strategy of developing Darwin Airport into a narrow-body hub. Over the next 12 months we will also be working hard to attract air services from major Asian hubs in order to provide improved connections from our key inbound markets in Europe and Asia. Currently less than 15% of international visitors to the Northern Territory enter through Darwin Airport, so there is a real opportunity to have these travellers either enter or depart Darwin during their travels to Australia.” he said.