The level of en-route delays by airlines across Europe rose by 18% in 2024 despite a “significant reduction” in strikes by air traffic controllers.
The year was marked by a strong recovery in traffic, particularly during the summer, but high air traffic flow management (ATFM) delays, “notably as a result of a lack of capacity and adverse weather,” Eurocontrol said.
“En-route ATFM delays recorded 2.1 minutes per flight for 2024 as a whole, which is higher than in 2023 owing to increased traffic and complexity due to airspace unavailability, increase in extreme weather events during the summer months, and capacity and staffing issues,” the European air traffic management body noted
“Despite the efforts to mitigate disruptions, there was a record-breaking delay comparable to the levels of 2001.”
The figures are disclosed in Eurocontrol’s 2024 network review, which revealed that 1.28 billion passengers used Europe’s top 40 airports in the January to November period, 7% more than in 2023.
The annual 10.7 million flight figure was 96% of the pre-pandemic 2019 level.
The total led to a 7% rise in CO2 emissions to 5.7 million tonnes against 2023.
Airlines within the Ryanair group operated the most flights across Europe in 2024 as the overall total rose by 5% year-on-year to 10.7 million.
The Irish budget airline and its subsidiaries ran as many as 3,044 daily flights, up 8% on 2023.
Lufthansa Group carriers flew 5% more flights a day at 2,717, above British Airways and Aer Lingus owner IAG airlines’ 2,256, up 4%.
EasyJet was the fifth largest aviation group in Europe with a rise of 5% to 1,553 daily flights, behind Air France-KLM with 1,858.
The peak day of the year was June 14 when 35,710 flights were operated.
The UK recorded the highest number of average daily flights at 5,488, up 4% on the previous year.
Spain was the next busiest with 4,984, followed by Germany with 4,711, France with 4,086 and Italy with 3,789.
Four countries in the top 10 are recorded traffic above 2019 levels.
Greece (up 18%) and Turkey (up 12%) had already surpassed their pre-Covid levels. Spain (up 8%) and Italy (up 6%) managed to fully recover in 2024.
“Overall, the south Mediterranean destinations were very popular for tourism, not only for north European visitors but also within the region itself,” the report said.
“For 2025, the number of flights is expected to reach 100% of 2019 levels in our base scenario, with some months potentially recording the same or higher numbers of flights compared to 2019.”
Air fares – excluding inflation – were slightly lower (-1%) compared to 2023.