Dubai airport registers record 27.9 mn passengers in H1, 2012

The traffic reached 27,931,639 passengers in H1 2012, up 13.7 per cent from 24,567,818 in the year-ago period.

The average monthly passenger traffic recorded in the first six months of the year stood at 4.65 million compared to 4.09 million in the same period of 2011, the report said.

With highest passenger volume, India, Saudi Arabia, the UK, Pakistan and the US emerged as the top destinations served by Dubai International during the period under review.

The AGCC continued to top the list of regions with the largest increase in total passenger numbers (180,397 passengers), followed by Western Europe (124,690), and India (82,543).

"We are on track to meet the annual projected traffic of 56.5 million passengers, which will bring us very close to Dubai International's operational capacity of 60 million passengers per annum.

"The addition of Concourse 3 during the first quarter of 2013 is well timed to boost our capacity to 75 million while upping the game on our already high levels of customer service," said Paul Griffiths, CEO of Dubai Airports.