Knock airport warns on loss of State subsidy

KNOCK AIRPORT recorded a profit last year but only after taking a government subvention into account.

It warned that the loss of the public service obligation subsidy from July would have “a significant financial impact on the company, regional tourism and business travellers”.

Accounts just filed at the Companies Office show the company behind the airport – Connaught Airport Development Ltd – recorded a pretax profit of €293,960.

That was down 48 per cent on 2009, with directors attributing much of the reduction on the impact of the ash cloud which impacted on Irish airspace.

Without the Department of Transport grant of €760,948 the operation would have recorded a pretax loss of €466,988 despite a fractional increase in revenues last year to €10.3 million from €10.1 million a year earlier.

In their report the airport company’s directors state that passenger numbers slipped just 3 per cent to 589,183 last year despite the difficult business environment and adverse weather conditions.

Yesterday the airport confirmed that last month was the busiest month in the airport’s history, with passenger numbers totalling 84,000.

On the company’s revenues for 2010, the directors say that although both aviation and commercial income incurred a significant decrease, an increase in fuel sales helped offset the shortfall.

The directors add that the airport continued to implement cost-reduction and efficiency measures. The numbers employed increased to 107 last year from 91 the year before.