Airport has 50M passengers a year

OIA is hosting about 5M more than it is designed to handle.

Orlando International Airport’s vibe of bursting at its seams has been officially confirmed with its latest announced passenger count at more than 50 million annually.

Reaching that milestone in October, that’s as many as every Orlando resident passing through the airport 280 times in a year.

“We could not be more pleased that we became the first Florida airport to hit such an incredible milestone,” airport director Phil

Brown said.

But while 50 million passengers annually is the most of any Florida airport – and Orlando’s airport now ranks as the nation’s 10th busiest – the airport also is hosting about 5 million passengers a year more than it is designed to handle.

The only significant relief to crowding at Orlando International Airport is the construction of a $3 billion terminal at the south end of the airport campus. It’s slated to open in about two years, by which time the airport could have nearly 54 million passengers, according to current growth rates.

The current holiday stretch is expected to set a record for the period, with 3.2 million passengers.

Airport authorities predict the five busiest days – each with about 40,000 passengers more than the daily average – will be: Sunday, Dec. 29, with 174,495 passengers; Sunday, Jan. 5, with 170,467; Thursday, Jan. 2, with 170,444; Monday, Dec. 30, with 168,341; and Saturday, Dec. 28, with 168,247 passengers.

Airport passenger growth in October was dampened by the September shutdown of Thomas

Cook Airlines, which began operations in Orlando in 2014 and flew as many as 16 flights a week.

But Spirit, JetBlue, Frontier and Delta airlines added more than 363,000 passengers in October compared to the same month in 2018.

Frontier in particular has seen rapid growth at Orlando International Airport.

This month, the Denver-based airline announced the opening of an 11,000-square-foot flight attendant training center at Orlando International Airport and also disclosed plans to build a 35,000-square-foot hanger for maintenance.

Once complete in 2021, Frontier will join Southwest, United, JetBlue and Silver as airlines with maintenance hangers at Orlando’s airport.

Frontier expects the maintenance operation to hire 45 workers with an average salary of $75,000.

Major airports nationwide are experiencing rapid or record-setting growth. Last week, Las Vegas’ McCarran International Airport announced that in November it reached an annual count of 50 million passengers.