Hartsfield-jackson handled 93.7 million passengers in 2022

Airport had busiest year since start of the pandemic.

Passenger counts at Hartsfield-jackson International Airport surged 24% last year, the busiest year since the start of the pandemic but not quite back to 2019’s record traffic.

The rebound at Hartsfield-jackson coincided with a boom in air travel as cooped up leisure travelers and grounded road warriors returned to the skies. But summer air travel snarls were headwinds for many airports. Delta Air Lines and other carriers are expected to return to busier flight schedules in 2023.

Hartsfield-jackson handled 93.7 million passen- gers in 2022, up from 75.7 million in 2021 and a pandemic low of 42.9 million in 2020.

The Atlanta airport still hasn’t seen traffic recover to pre-pandemic levels. In 2019, the airport handled a record 110.5 million passengers.

An airport in Guangzhou, China, briefly overtook Hartsfield-jackson with more pas- sengers in 2020, but Hartsfield-jackson reclaimed its title as the world’s busiest airport in 2021.

Official airport industry rankings have not yet been released declaring whether Hartsfield-jackson retained its crown in 2022.

Last year, the vast majority of air travel through Atlanta was domestic passengers. The total included 83.7 million people getting on and off domestic flights and just less than 10 million flying internationally.

In Hartsfield-jack- son handled more than 97 million domestic passengers and million inter- national passengers.

Atlanta-based Delta cut back its flight schedule last year after its staffing issues caused mass flight cancella- tions over the summer. Hartsfield-jackson General Manager Balram Bheodari has said Hartsfield-jackson’s traffic is still well below pre-pandemic levels because Delta held back on restoring more flights in Atlanta last year.

In 2022, Delta focused on adding flights at its coastal hubs in New York, Boston, Seattle and Los Angeles to maintain market share in those competitive markets.

Much of the Delta’s focus to add flights back this year will be in Atlanta, which is its “biggest, most profitable hub,” according to Delta Chief Financial Officer Dan Janki at the company’s investor day in December. This year, Atlanta will make up 45% of Delta’s domestic growth.

Delta President Glen Hauenstein said last month the airline’s flight schedule was about 85% restored at Hartsfield-jackson, and is expected to be 95% restored by summer and 100% restored by fall.