Passengers through Turkish airports up in October

The number of passengers going through Turkish airports climbed 4% on an annual basis in October, the country's airport authority announced Friday.

Some 19.4 million passengers traveled through airports in Turkey last month, according to the General Directorate of State Airports Authority (DHMI).

Data showed that the number of international passengers stood at 10.9 million, marking a 15% rise year-on-year, while domestic fliers saw an 8.7% decline to 8.4 million during the same period.

The country's airports served 182,654 planes -- including overflights -- in the month.

The new Istanbul Airport, whose first phase officially opened last fall and which took over air traffic from the former main Atatürk Airport on April 6, hosted nearly 6.2 million passengers in October and served nearly 38,000 planes.

In January-October, Turkish airports saw 180.8 million air passengers, down 1.4% from the same period last year.

International passenger traffic surged 11% on an annual basis to 95.7 million in the first ten months of 2019.

The figure was down 12.3% for passengers taking domestic flights, standing at 84.9 million in the same period.

During the January-October period, Turkish airports served 1.73 million planes -- including overflights.

The DHMI data revealed that cargo traffic was fell by 12% to 2.9 million tons.

Istanbul Airport attracted 41.8 million passengers, serving 260,382 planes.

The airport in the Mediterranean resort city of Antalya was the busiest airport in touristic destinations with 33.5 million travelers -- some 6.1 million passengers on domestic flights and nearly 27.4 million passengers on international flights.