March 2020 U.S. Airline Traffic Data (Final)

U.S. airlines carried 36.6 million systemwide (domestic and international) scheduled service passengers in March 2020, seasonally-adjusted, according to the Bureau of Transportation Statistics’ (BTS), down 53.2% from February.

BTS is withholding the scheduled release of estimated U.S. airlines’ traffic data for April and May because the estimates are statistical forecasts based on previous trends. The estimates do not account for the coronavirus.

U.S. airlines carried 32.3 million domestic passengers and 4.4 million international passengers in March, seasonally-adjusted.

Figure 1. Monthly Passengers on U.S. Scheduled Airlines (Domestic + International), Seasonally Adjusted, Mar 2017 – Mar 2020

Two measures of U.S. airlines passenger enplanements

March seasonally-adjusted

• System-wide enplanements (36.6M) were down 53.6% from the all-time high of 79.0 million reached in December 2019.
• Domestic enplanements (32.3M) were down 53.4% from the all-time high of 69.3 million reached in December 2019.
• International enplanements (4.36M) were down 55.2% from the all-time, high of 9.74 million reached in June 2019.

March (actual) unadjusted

• Systemwide enplanements (39.1M) were down 51.3% from the all-time March high (80.2 million) reached in 2019.
• Domestic enplanements (34.4M) were down 51.0% from the all-time March high (70.2 million) reached in 2019.
• International enplanements (4.65M) were down 53.4% from the all-time March high (9.9 million) reached in 2019.

Table A. Seasonally Adjusted Reported Passenger Enplanements Compared to Previous Time Periods, March 2020

Seasonally Adjusted	Passengers (in millions)	Percent Change Compared to
		Previous Month	Previous Year	Three Years Previous
March reported	36.6	-53.2%	-52.8%	-47.7%

Table B. Unadjusted Reported Passenger Enplanements Compared to Previous Time Periods, March 2020

Unadjusted	Passengers (in millions)	Percent Change Compared to
		Previous Year	Two Years Previous	Three Years Previous
March reported	39.1	-51.3%	-48.8%	-46.5%

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