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MANILA, Philippines – The expansion of the Clark International Airport terminal will be completed by September ahead of the start of Emirates’ Clark-Dubai service, which is expected to bring more passengers.
The volume of passengers using the gateway rose 62% in the first quarter of 2013, and this is expected to rise further once Emirates’ new route is launched in October.
Victor Jose Luciano, president and chief executive officer of the Clark International Airport Corp. (CIAC), said in a statement the P360 million expansion would double the capacity of the existing terminal to up to 5 million passengers from the current capacity of 2 million to 2.5 million.
“The expansion project is expected to be completed by September,” he said.
Q1 passenger volume
Luciano said the number of international and domestic passengers flying out of Clark jumped 62% to 408,895 in the first quarter, from 252,163 in the same quarter last year.
In March alone, passenger volume was up 56.6% at 131,626.
He attributed the growth to the steady increase in the number of international flights.
“We expect this to further increase as we are anticipating the start of the Emirates non-stop daily flights between Dubai and Clark and vice versa on October 1,” he noted.
Luciano said Emirates would connect Clark to the rest of Middle East and Europe using the Boeing 777-300ERs aircraft.
Clark airport also plays host to various budget and legacy carriers including Air Asia Berhad of Malaysia, Air Asia Philippines, Philippine Airlines’ PAL Express, Seair-Tiger, Cebu Pacific, Jin Air, Asiana Airlines, and Dragonair.
In 2012, these airlines flew 1.3 million passengers, up 71% from 767,000 in 2011.
This year, CIAC expects the number of passengers using the Clark airport to hit 2 million. – Rappler.com
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