Half-term holidays give London Stansted busiest passenger day in airport history

Over 100,000 passengers passed through the airport on 27 October

Nov 12, 2024 - 21:01

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Half-term holidays give London Stansted busiest passenger day in airport history

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Half-term holidays saw London Stansted experience its busiest day in history, with a record number of travellers taking off for European holiday hotspots.

On 27 October, more than 107,000 passengers passed through the airport’s terminal on the first weekend of the autumn break.

The airport revealed that destinations across Turkey, the Canaries, Spain, and Portugal were the most popular with holidaymakers seeking sunnier climes.

At the same time, international arrivals to London for European football and NFL games peaked at the end of last month.

Previously, the highest recorded footfall of passengers was 104,000, which was set on 23 August 2024.

Over the last 12 months from October, 29.45 million passengers have used London Stansted for travel, an increase of 6.7 per cent compared to the previous year.

According to the airport, 99 per cent of passengers passed through security in 15 minutes or less during the busiest day, with an average queue time of two minutes during the main departure peaks.

Earlier this month, the aviation hub announced plans to invest £1.1 billion in airport services over five years to help “secure links to global destinations” and “transform the airport journey”.

Gareth Powell, London Stansted’s managing director, said: “To record the busiest day in the history of London Stansted in late October is an incredible achievement and a powerful reflection of reliability, great choice, value and operational efficiency the airport and our airline partners are able to offer our passengers.

“We know all these aspects of travel are really important to passengers when choosing where they fly to and from, so our teams work hard every day to ensure we do all we can to make the airport experience as seamless and smooth as possible while offering the best connectivity to Europe of any UK airport.”

For more travel news and advice, listen to Simon Calder’s podcast