Luis Muñoz Marín Int’l Airport posts ‘strongest recovery’ for parent company
The Luis Muñoz Marín International Airport (LMM) posted the strongest recovery related to passenger traffic, exceeding second quarter 2019 levels by 10% driven by a high double-digit increase in domestic traffic, which more than offset a weaker international performance, Adolfo Castro-Rivas, CEO of Grupo Aeroportuario del Sureste, confirmed
The Mexican firm, known as ASUR, is the parent company of Aerostar, which operates the LMM.
During the second quarter of 2021, nearly 2.7 million passengers used the LMM facility, which represented a seven-fold growth when compared to the 335,606 passengers recorded during the same year-ago quarter.
Castro-Rivas made his comments while discussing the company’s second quarter 2021 results, which include its airport operations in Colombia and Mexico as well. Overall, he said passenger traffic in the second quarter of 2021 continued to gradually recover to 14.4% below pre-pandemic levels of the second quarter of 2019, which is the period the company is using to compare numbers, given that most airports were closed during a significant period in 2020 due to COVID-19.
By country of operations, second quarter of 2021 passenger traffic compared to 2Q19 levels were as follows:
- Mexico: declined 16.3%, with domestic and international traffic down 12.1% and 20.4%, respectively
- Puerto Rico (Aerostar): increased 10.5%, with domestic traffic up 19.3% and international traffic down 58.1%
- Colombia: declined 29.6%, with domestic and international traffic down 30.6% and 24.5%, respectively.
During the analysis of the results, Castro-Rivas said the company invested about $3 million in capital improvements to LMM during the second quarter, as Aerostar undertakes previously reported maintenance repairs to runways and taxiways at Puerto Rico’s main air hub.
