Vancouver International Airport's passenger volumes continue to soar

Lengthy security line at Vancouver International Airport in late August 2022 due to CATSA job action. (@KalebKrol/Twitter)

For the second consecutive month, Vancouver International Airport (YVR) has pushed above the two million line for its monthly passenger count.

Preliminary figures provided by YVR show it recorded 2.101 million passengers in August 2022 — including 1.063 million departing passengers, and 1.038 million arriving passengers.

This is the highest monthly total since the onset of the pandemic and represents 84% of the 2.511 million passengers recorded in August 2019.

August 2022 is up from 1.91 million for June 2022 and 2.06 million for July 2022.

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August is typically one of the busiest months at YVR, with peak summer season tourism and the return of students ahead of the start of the new school year.

YVR has experienced sustained, consecutive, month-over-month passenger growth over the course of the entire year to date.

Over the first eight months of 2022, YVR has recorded a total of about 11 million passengers — about 65% of what was recorded over the same period in 2019.

If YVR is able to hit at least two million passengers per month over the final four months of 2022, it could end the year with about 20 million passengers — comparable to the annual volumes of 2014 or 2015. The airport reached a historic record of 26.4 million passengers in 2019.

Statistics earlier in the summer suggest YVR’s domestic traffic — making up the highest proportion of the volumes — has fully recovered to pre-pandemic volumes, while US transborder and European traffic has neared normal.

YVR’s largest international sub-market after US transborder is the Asia Pacific. But the Asia Pacific volumes have seen a far slower pace in recovery due to China, Hong Kong, and Japan’s strict quarantine rules and travel restrictions.

The growing passenger volumes are a clear sign of a return to normal, but airports around the world — dogged by labour shortages — have been unable to keep up with the staggering pace of the return in passenger demand.

Job action of security screening workers under the federal government’s Canadian Air Transport Security Authority (CATSA) in late August 2022, one of the busiest periods for travel, led to the longest security lines yet at YVR in years.

CATSA notes that 81.45% of passengers travelling from YVR in August 2022 were screened within 15 minutes.

Furthermore, YVR states its 99% of outbound baggage had a 99% success rate, meaning nearly all baggage was processed on time and departed alongside the passenger from the airport.

The month saw a total of about 1,011,332 bags, including 707,509 outbound bags.

Final detailed statistics for YVR’s July and August 2022 volumes have yet to be released.

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