Passenger numbers rise again at Dubai International

Dubai International Airport continues to go from strength to strength, as the facility accommodated 5.08 million passengers last month.Following on from a record-breaking year in 2012, leaders at Dubai Airports confirmed that visitor numbers grew by 11.4 per cent in February 2013 when compared with the corresponding month last year.This impressive performance has had a positive impact on the airport's year-to-date figures, with 10.6 million people landing at the UAE aviation hub in the first two months of the year - a 13 per cent increase on the same period in 2012.Encouragingly, statistics that monitor average passengers per aircraft movement also reached a record-high of 201, which was up from 193 12 months ago. This is a good indication of airport efficiency and it seems Dubai International is getting things right.Again, eastern Europe was the fastest-growing market for the airport in February, with an overall percentage rise of 29.6. This was driven largely by new services to Poland and Macedonia, as well as increased uptake of flights from Russia.Dubai is unsurprisingly very popular among people from eastern Europe, especially at this time of year when temperatures in places like Warsaw and Moscow can plummet deep into minus territory.That said, the three biggest markets for the airport continued to be India, Great Britain and Saudi Arabia. The number of passengers flying into the UAE city from all of these places increased during February.Dubai Airports chief executive officer Paul Griffiths was understandably very pleased with the figures."We continue to stay ahead of the curve in terms of our traffic forecast of 65.4 million passengers in 2013," he remarked, before adding: "We are also on track in terms of introducing capacity to meet demand."The airport's capacity has been increased from 60 million to 75 million passengers a year and plans are also in place to take it to 90 million by the end of the decade.Last month, Mr Griffiths said the introduction of the new Concourse A building had come at a near-perfect time.