NigerianFLIGHTDECK Travel and Business Reportage 
TURKISH Airlines has announced that it completed the year 2017 with a great success with an increased passenger factor of 9.3% after airlifting 68.6 million air travelers.
The number of passengers in 2017 compared to the previous year reached 79.1% by increasing 4.7 points. The flag carrier has reached highest December load factor rate with 79.5% in the last month of 2017 in its history
Chairman of the Board and the Executive Committee of Turkish Airlines Mr M. İlker Aycı had given the first signal of the global carrier’s proven success at the end of 2017, in January 2017 and Mr İlker Aycı had stated that; ‘‘ We believe that 2017 year will be much better year than 2016. We made our plans and savings accordingly. We are analyzing the conditions of our home country, our region, our industry, the developments and trends in aviation and tourism sector.
I believe that we will complete 2017 successfully and Turkish Airlines will complete the year with increased power, brand value and market share once again’’.
Announced by Turkish Airlines;
Evaluation of December 2017 Traffic Results:
• Total Load Factor improved by 5.1 points to 79.7% with an increase of 8.9% in Available Seat Kilometer, while international LF increased by 5 points to 79.2%. Domestic and International flights have reached the highest LF of Turkish Airlines history.
• Double-digit growth in demand (revenue per kilometer) that commenced in July, kept on with 16.3% demand growth.
• Total number of passengers carried went up by 21.4% reaching 5.5 million passengers. Compared to December 2015, number of passengers carried and demand increased by 17%.
• Excluding international-to-international transfer passengers (transit passengers), number of international passengers went up by 39%.
• In December, cargo/mail volume increased by 18.4%, compared to December 2016. Main contributors to the growth in cargo/mail volume, are Middle East with 28.7% increase and Europe with 24% increase.
• In December, Load Factor increased for all regions. Middle East, North America and Africa showed visible growth among other regions with 7,1 points, 6.8 points and 5.6 points increase, respectively.
Evaluation of January-December 2017 Traffic Results:
• During January-December, increase in demand and total number of passengers was 7.9% and 9.3%, respectively, over the same period of last year. Total number of passengers reached to 68.6 million.
• During January-December, total Load Factor improved by 4.7 points up to 79.1%, while international Load Factor increased by 5 points, up to 78.4%.
