No-frills airline WestJet sees 43.4% increase in passenger traffic in May Canadian Press Tuesday, June 10, 2003 CALGARY (CP) - WestJet's passenger traffic was up 43.4 per cent in May compared to the same month a year ago, the Calgary-based no frills airline said Tuesday. WestJet said it had 382 million revenue passenger miles - a key industry measure of passenger traffic - in May, up from 266.4 million in May 2002. The increase comes despite ongoing concern about the SARS outbreak centred in the Toronto area, but also comes a month after the end of the war in Iraq, which had been blamed for impacting April air travel. For the year, WestJet's passenger traffic is up 46.4 per cent to 1.7 billion revenue passenger miles from 1.1 billion in the first five months of 2002. Meanwhile WestJet's capacity, or available seat miles, grew 49.1 per cent in May compared with the prior year and its load factor - a measure of how full its planes fly - was 72.2 per cent compared with 75.1 per cent in May 2002. Air Canada, which is operating under bankruptcy court protection, has yet to release its May traffic statistics. But it reported a month ago an operating loss of $354 million in the first quarter, compared to $194 million in 2002, and a drop in revenue to $2.21 billion from $2.29 billion. Revenue passenger miles declined seven per cent to 9.19 billion. Air Canada also said recently that advanced bookings for May, June and July were down by 20 to 25 per cent from a year ago. Air Canada is continuing to offer discounts, including a current offer of a $19 one-way fare, before taxes and other charges, from Toronto to Ottawa. WestJet chairman and chief executive Clive Beddoe has in recent weeks accused Air Canada of pursuing a "scorched earth policy" with endless seat-sales in recent weeks. *************************************************** 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/ Mas Site: www.tntisland.com/tntrecords/mas2003/ Site of the Week: http://www.natalielaughlin.com/ TnT Webdirectory: http://search.co.tt *********************************************************