‘A pandemic is not something that’s within anyone’s control’

Aberdeen’s airport has been hard hit by lockdown, and its boss told Rebecca Buchan the industry needs urgent help

“We definitely expect as low recovery–all the signs are there

When Flybe called in the administrators in March it signalled the beginning of what is undoubtedly one of the most challenging periods in the history of Aberdeen International Airport (AIA).

Seen as the gateway to the region, the terminal functions as potentially the most significant port of connectivity in the north-east, at its peak filtering through around 300,000 passengers each month.

However when the UK entered lockdown travel restrictions all but closed the skies overnight – something that had only previously been experienced in short bursts following the 9/11 terror attacks and the Icelandic ash cloud.

Both of these events had significant ramifications for aviation, but nothing compared to what has been experienced as a result of the coronavirus pandemic.

Roger Hunt, interim managing director at AIA, who has also spent a considerable amount of his career in management positions within RBS, said Covid-19 would be seen as the crisis to reshape the aviation industry in the same way as the global financial crash of 2008 reshaped the financial services sector.

In an interview with the business, he said there would be a long recovery time and it was unlikely the airport would see passenger numbers similar to 2019 until 2023 at least.

In the last few months, he said, there had been a 95% reduction in passenger numbers and the airport’s initial challenge would be to retain as many of the current routes out of Aberdeen as possible.

Mr Hunt said the sector would be one of the last to recover from the pandemic and called for governments to work cohesively as well as to consider some sort of financial package or relief which would bail out the industry.

“We definitely expect a slow recovery, and all the signs are already there; it’s going to be a slow recovery. In the past you have had ash clouds and 9/11 where everything was grounded for four days but you are effectively looking at a scenario where this is now four months and unquestionably aviation will be reshaped for the future in the same way the financial services sector was reshaped through the global financial crisis of 2008,” he said.

“Aviation was first to feel the full impact of the pandemic. It effectively closed the skies overnight with people not travelling.

“We are unfortunately going to be one of the last to recover from this and we are still looking for support from government to get the industry back on its feet.

“What was hugely disappointing for us is that the chancellor, right at the start of the pandemic, announced there would be a specific support package for aviation and it wasn’t long after it was announced that it was taken back off the table.

“We would still like to see some package or form of sector support – that would be really, really welcome. It would be a boost to aviation and a stimulus for local economies.”

Mr Hunt said that while many businesses were forced to close during the pandemic the airport had to remain open to service the northeast’s oil and gas industry, and provide a lifeline to the islands and air ambulance services.

He said the commercials of staying open had been “madness” but insisted it was essential for the region to be able to continue to function.

As a result of this, the airport experienced the highest passenger numbers in the UK during many stages of the lockdown.

He added: “Financially staying open is not something you would do unless you had to but if we were to close things would really struggle to continue to flow in the north-east. What this has meant is that at times throughout the pandemic we have been the busiest airport in the UK, including Heathrow, in terms of passenger numbers.

“In reality we would want that to have been a significantly bigger number but we wanted to continue to support the region through Covid.”

He said the “real challenge” now was how the airport could build back from where it is now.

Mr Hunt added: “How do we make sure we hold on to the routes we’ve got and not lose anything; because we can run away with ourselves here and think the priority is to go away and get lots of new routes and build connectivity that wasn’t there before.

“But we have to get a steady foothold on routes we already had and make sure we hold onto them because losing what we already have would be a major blow to the north-east and impact adversely to the connectivity that was already there.

“We have always tried, as our strategy, to increase routes to summer sun; that’s still part of our strategy but our job has just become a lot more challenging. A pandemic is not something that is within anyone’s control. Both the UK and Scottish governments have had massive jobs on their hands to navigate us through this and public safety and public health, we completely align to this.

“People have lost their lives to this and we don’t take lightly the fact that some of the decisions that have had to be taken are there for the right reason.

“I guess what we are getting increasingly disappointed with is the lack of clarity and lack of being joined up in the approach to bringing the industry back, as well as the lack of support for the industry.

“The abolition or freeze of Air Passenger Duty (APD) to stimulate increased airline activity would be hugely welcome.

“Even taking part of that as a stimulus for airlines, then part of it can be put towards a contribution to environmental or sustainability or a green tax.

“There are different ways they can be creative with that but the key thing is not passing that entire cost on as they currently do.”

Passengers are now returning, but there are far fewer travellers