BANGKOK, June 27 – Airports of Thailand (AoT) announced that it earned a profit of more than Bt7.9 billion in the first half of the 2013 fiscal year (Oct 2012-Mar 2013), an increase from Bt4.2 billion year-on-year.
AoT president Sitha Thiwaree said all six AoT airports saw increased year-on-year profit, during the eight months from October last year to May this year, at 21 per cent in the number of passengers that reached 57 million and at 15 per cent in the number of flights reaching 370,000.
Most of the 34 million passengers used Suvarnabhumi International Airport in some 190,000 flights, Squadron Leader Sitha said. By the end of this year, AoT expects the number of passengers to amount to 85 million carried in more than 550,000 flights at all six airports.
Regarding airport development, AoT plans to start the second phase of Suvarnabhumi International Airport so it could support 60 million passengers from the current capability at 45 million/year. The expansion is expected to begin in August next year.
Don Mueang Airport improvement is also to take place to support large aircraft such as the Airbus A380 by 2017 as well as the number of passengers at 39 million from currently 18.5 million.
In other regions, AoT is developing Phuket International Airport for further capacity to carry more passengers — 12.5 million in 2015 from the current 6.5 million/year. It will increase aircraft bays to 25 from the existing 15. Five bays are to be complete by year end.
Airports of Thailand has targeted Chiang Mai International Airport to become one of the world’s top-five best airports for no more than 5 million passengers by next year.
