Turkey’s THY becomes 7th biggest airline company in Europe
Posted by meb at September 12th, 2008
Turkey’s state-run airliner Turkish Airlines (THY) has become the 7th largest airline company in Europe, outpacing Italy’s Alitalia by passengers carried in the first seven months of the year.
THY carried 12.16 million passengers, a 15.7 percent rise in January-July period, and climbed to the 7th rank, according to figures given by the Association of European Airlines.
THY grabbed troubled Italian airliner Alitalia’s position as the Italian carrier was having financial problems and saw 17.4 percent fall in the number of passengers to 11.8 million. Italian government mulls to sell Alitalia.
THY ranked the 8th in 2007 with its 10.5 million passengers carried.
Germany’s Lufthansa topped the list as the biggest European airline company with 32.2 million passengers. Air France that flied 29.6 million people was the second and British Airways came the third with 18.7 million passengers.
In the next five years, fast growing THY is expected to jump into first five in the list of Europe’s biggest airline companies.
source: Hurriyet daily
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