Passenger numbers at Heathrow fell by almost 2% last month compared with June 2006, amid growing concerns that the high level of security is hitting transfer traffic.
Airport operator BAA would not confirm that a decline in transfer passengers was to blame, arguing it does not track this traffic. But British Airways has consistently attributed falling Heathrow passenger numbers to heightened security since last August.
It is argued travellers are switching to regional services to competing European hubs such as Paris Charles de Gaulle, Amsterdam and Frankfurt.
An airline source said: “There is no doubt Heathrow is losing transfer traffic due to the queues at security.”
However, the decline at Stansted, where there is virtually no transfer traffic, was slightly greater at 1.9%, compared with 1.8% at Heathrow.
Only Gatwick among BAA’s London airports bucked the trend, recording a 1.3% increase in passengers for the month year on year, and a 3.3% rise for the 12 months to June.
A BAA spokesman admitted the fall at Heathrow was “significant”, following a year of decline, but was not just to do with security alerts.
“Heathrow has been suffering because it is full,” he said. “You won’t see any changes until Terminal 5 opens. Then we will have more aircraft stands and terminal capacity.”
The spokesman agreed that repeated delays to the baggage of BA passengers had not helped the airport’s reputation. BA promised to clear the latest backlog of 20,000 bags by the end of last week, but bags remained undelivered at Terminal 4 on Monday.
Lord Clive Solely, chairman of airport lobbying group Future Heathrow, has warned: “Passengers will begin moving away from Heathrow. Munich overtook the airport in the number of destinations it serves in March, and Milan and Madrid will overtake it soon.”
BAA reported a 0.6% year-on-year fall in passengers across its seven airports (Heathrow, Gatwick, Stansted, Glasgow, Edinburgh, Aberdeen and Southampton) in June, following a 1.6% fall in April, but a 0.3% rise in May.
Domestic traffic in June was down almost 4% and transatlantic traffic flat, with a 7% decline in charter traffic compared with a year ago. Long-haul traffic was up 4%.