European airline traffic drops again due to war in Iraq BRUSSELS, Belgium (AP) =97 Airline traffic has plunged due to the war in=20 Iraq, wiping out all the meager growth European airlines managed to achieve= =20 this year, an industry group said Tuesday. The Association of European=20 Airlines said its 30 member airlines reported a 10.4% drop in passengers=20 from March 31 to April 6, the third week of the war in Iraq. Traffic losses= =20 on long-haul routes to the Middle East were the main reason for the drop.=20 They were down 45.5% compared to the same week last year. Traffic on=20 flights to Europe declined 15% and flights to North America were down 7.7%.= =20 Flights to Asia were off 10.1%, but those were also being affected by the=20 newly discovered SARS virus. Tuesday's figures follow similarly dismal=20 results last month, which saw a 12.4% drop in international passengers=20 during the first week of the war and 7.4% the second week. Before the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq, passengers on European airlines had=20 started to slowly increase from their low levels following the Sept. 11=20 terrorist attacks. Now the war is threatening this recovery, the AEA said.= =20 "For the first ten weeks of the year, our market was growing," said AEA=20 Secretary General Ulrich Schulte-Strathaus. "In just four weeks, that=20 growth has been completely wiped out." outes to rival airlines. Airlines=20 argued the practice was unfairly punishing carriers that wanted to halt=20 some routes during the war, but didn't want to end the routes permanently.= =20 So far EU transport ministers have rejected any wider bailout of the=20 industry. Members of the association include Lufthansa, British Airways,=20 KLM, Iberia and Air France. *************************************************** The owner of Roger's Trinbago Site/TnTisland.com Roj (Roger James) escape email mailto:ejames@xxxxxxxxx Trinbago site: www.tntisland.com Carib Brass Ctn site www.tntisland.com/caribbeanbrassconnection/ Steel Expressions www.mts.net/~ejames/se/ Site of the Week: http://www.carstt.com TnT Webdirectory: http://search.co.tt *********************************************************