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Wizz Air Holdings PLC on Friday hailed a traffic milestone, as it recorded 1,200 flights in a single day. Shares in the Budapest-based budget airline fell 1.9% to 1,168.00 pence in London on Friday morning , but are up 11% over the past year. It noted the milestone as equivalent to one flight taking off every 72 seconds on average, and to more than 200,000 passengers per day across 45 countries. ‘Operating 1,200 flights in one day is a proud moment for Wizz Air and is powered by our growing fleet of 267 state of the art aircraft, our expanding network and, most importantly, the strong demand from passengers,’ commented Chief Operations Officer Diarmuid O’Conghaile. Wizz also noted that this milestone comes amid ‘a busy summer travel season’, citing a forecast from the International Air Transport Association for global passenger traffic growth to grow 2.1% in 2026. On its website, IATA described this growth rate as ‘a material slowdown from recent years’, reflecting the energy price shock from conflict in the Middle East. In IATA’s view, ‘underlying willingness to travel has not collapsed, only moderated’. Last week, Wizz declined to provide guidance for the current financial year, citing uncertainty due to the Middle East conflict and closure of the Strait of Hormuz. For the year ended March 31, Wizz posted pretax profit of €27.0 million, up 37% from €19.7 million for the previous year. Total revenue increased 8.0% to €5.69 billion from €5.27 billion, while Wizz Air’s passenger count rose 10% to a ‘record’ 69.7 million from 63.4 million. The airline said the war between the US, Israel and Iran negatively impacted earnings by an estimated €50 million, although it said fuel hedges implemented before the conflict ‘largely mitigated’ this. Copyright 2026 Alliance News Ltd. All Rights Reserved.
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