Taoyuan International Airport, Taiwan’s main international gateway, will handle an estimated 72,316 passengers Saturday, the most since Taiwan began reopening its borders and easing COVID-19 restrictions on Oct. 13, 2022, the airport’s operator said.
Taoyuan International Airport Corp. said it expected to see a total of 35,491 outbound passengers on Saturday, amid a recent surge in overseas air travel as the Lunar New Year holiday approaches.
That number far exceeded the 26,843 outbound travelers who used the airport on Jan. 13. In the days before that, outbound travelers totaled 26,148 on Jan. 12 and averaged 22,000 per day from Jan. 7 to Jan. 11.
Outbound travel demand peaked in the morning, when many departing passengers were caught in long lines for up to an hour waiting to go through security.
A Taiwanese couple heading to Japan told CNA that the long wait caught them by surprise and left them with almost no time to shop at the airport’s duty-free stores before boarding their flight.
Still, the overall traveler numbers are well short of the traffic seen at the airport prior to the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic.
Taoyuan International Airport handled a record 48,689,372 passengers in 2019, an average of about 133,500 per day.
As COVID-19, took hold, annual traffic fell to 7,438,325 passengers in 2020, 909,012 in 2021, and 3,758,417 in 2022.
Taiwan reopened its borders to visitors on Oct. 13, 2022, when it raised the weekly inbound arrival quota from 60,000 to 150,000, and ended a mandatory quarantine for those arrivals.
Inbound passengers are now only required to monitor their health on their own and follow certain preventive testing measures over a seven-day period after they arrive.
The weekly cap was further raised to 200,000 on Dec. 1 and eventually eliminated on Dec. 10.
The aviation sector is picking up momentum as well, with major airlines announcing increases in the number of flights offerd.
Taiwan’s flagship carrier China Airlines said that it will launch direct flight services to Chiang Mai, Thailand, resume flights to Rome, and add flights to Vienna and London.
Likewise, EVA Airways, Tigerair Taiwan and StarLux Airlines have said they will increase flights in 2023, mainly to destinations in North America, Japan and Southeast Asia, respectively.
Source: Focus Taiwan News Channel