MUSCAT: Passenger volume at Muscat International Airport soared 16.6 per cent in 2016, driving numbers up to over 12.03 million from 10.31 million passengers in 2015, according to the latest data released by the National Centre for Statistics and Information (NCSI). Compared to 2015, the number of international flights at the airport also went up by 11.6 per cent to 93,822 (46,913 landings and 46,909 take-offs). However, domestic flights came down by 12.2 per cent to 9,504 which included 4,751 landings and 4,753 take-offs. There has been an increase of 17.3 per cent in the number of international passengers at over 11 million, comprising over 5.54 million arrivals, 5.43 million departures and 27,638 transit passengers.
International passenger arrivals went up 16.9 per cent while departures rose 17.9 per cent. However, transit passenger numbers declined 7.8 per cent in 2016. In contrast, the domestic arrivals rose 10.7 per cent to 518,337 while domestic departures reached 505,117 marking a rise of 9.2 per cent over figures for 2015. Total domestic passengers increased 9.9 per cent to over 1.02 million last year, the NCSI report said. Taking both international and domestic figures, the number of flights at the Muscat International Airport went up 8.9 per cent to 103,326 last year, as against 94,920 flights logged in 2015. — ONA
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