The Singapore Airlines (SIA) Group’s passenger capacity (measured in available seat-kilometres) stood at 44 percent of pre-Covid-191 levels in February 2022, two percentage points below the January 2022 level. This was attributable to February being a shorter month. Group passenger load factor declined by 0.9 percentage points to 39.1 percent (+29.4 percentage points year-on-year). Ticket sales on Vaccinated Travel Lane (VTL) services remained subject to a 50 percent reduction in arrival quotas in the first half of February. On 16 February 2022, Singapore announced that it would remove the 50 percent cap, and progressively increase the VTL quota for daily arrivals from 5,000 to 15,000, by 4 March 2022. Based on the Group’s current published schedule, the Group expects passenger capacity to reach around 57 percent of pre-COVID levels by April 2022.
Cargo operations registered a cargo load factor (CLF) of 69 percent in February 2022, or 25.6 percentage points lower year-on-year, in line with seasonal fluctuations. Capacity (capacity tonne-kilometre) was up 50.4 percent as a result of the progressive resumption of passenger flights. On the other hand, cargo loads (freight tonne-kilometres) only rose 9.8 percent as overall air cargo demand eased during the Chinese New Year holiday period. More bellyhold space was also allocated for carriage of passenger bags as passenger load factor improved.
At the end of February 2022, the Group’s passenger network covered 87 destinations including Singapore. During the month, Scoot, SIA’s low-cost carrier subsidiary, introduced a new destination, Miri, to its network. There were also several service resumptions, which included Denpasar by SIA, and Gold Coast and Hanoi by Scoot. As at end of February, SIA served 63 destinations2 while Scoot served 37 destinations.
The Singapore Airlines Group will further expand its Vaccinated Travel Lane (VTL) network in the coming weeks, bringing it to a total of 66 cities3 in 27 countries. New VTL services will be added progressively to selected cities in Southeast Asia and India, as well as Athens, from 16 March 2022. More non-VTL flights will also be converted to VTL flights for certain destinations.
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