Platov international airport (managed by Airports of Regions MC) has reviewed its performance results for 2020. The traffic at Platov amounted to 2m86thou passengers in 2020, down 31.8% year-on-year. Because of the pandemic Platov lost almost 973,000 passengers.
The traffic reduction took its toll on all segments of air services. A short-term improvement of the situation in September and October did not have any noticeable impact upon the general picture. The number of passengers contracted most markedly on Moscow flights where it sagged by 42.6%. Direct interregional services on the routes bypassing Moscow were a lot better off, since the traffic reduction there was only 3.4%. This was the result of the joint effort taken by Platov airport, its backbone carrier Azimuth Airlines, and Rostov Region’s government.
The main challenge of 2020 was definitely the pandemic and counter-epidemiological measures to prevent further spread of COVID-19 infection, Platov being no exception. No-contact thermometry of visitors and passengers using red scanners was organized in the entrance and preflight inspection areas. Automatic no-contact dispensers with a hand antiseptic have been set up in all functional zones. The personnel of contacting zones wear facemasks, disposal gloves, protective glasses or shields. Apart from the two capital cities, Yekaterinburg was the third most popular destination for inland flights, having overtaken the resort destinations. The Urals capital city was followed by Simferopol, Sochi, Ufa, Samara and Makhachkala. Despite the difficult situation in the industry, new destinations and flights were launched from Platov in 2020: to Saratov and Yekaterinburg inside Russia, and to the island of Zanzibar (Tanzania) abroad. The markings applied on the floor and chairs help people keep social distancing. All contacting surfaces like check-in counters, the handrails of elevators and moving stairs as well as boarding gate counters are disinfected. Only passengers wearing facemasks may claim the airport’s services. In the lack of a facemask the latter can be purchased in vending machines set up all over the terminal. Due to the timely measures taken, Platov has become the first regional airport of Russia to resume international flights. But on the whole the traffic on flights abroad has sagged by 38.4%.
Overall regular and charter flights on 41 routes were operated by 24 airlines from Platov airport last year, with 21 of them performing regular flights.
Most passengers (529,700 people) were transported by the backbone carrier of Platov airport, namely Azimuth Airlines. Azimuth becomes the leading carrier at Platov airport for the second year in a row. The TOP-5 leaders also include Aeroflot – Russian Airlines, AZUR Air, S7 and Smartavia. AZUR Air and Smartavia are the newbie in the rating.
