Number of travelers on S.Korea's LCCs jumped 104-fold in Q1

Demand for overseas flights in South Korea has exploded since the resumption of air travel operations amid the substantial easing of COVID-19 restrictions.

Domestic low-cost carriers (LCCs) are raising the number of chartered international flights and conducting aggressive marketing by using new routes.

The Ministry of Land, Infrastructure and Transport on Monday released data saying the number of passengers on international flights of national airlines in the first quarter reached 9,877,577, a 16-fold jump from 619,204 in the same quarter last year. Over half or 5.41 million people rode LCCs, an astounding surge of around 104-fold from just 52,000 year on year.

Though demand for going abroad is surging, industry observers say travelers are mainly targeting LCCs because of thin wallets due to high interest rates and the economic slowdown.

LCCs are scrambling to meet growing demand for overseas travel during holidays next month and summer vacation by expanding their range of destinations through the launch of irregular chartered flights.

From May 17-18, the country's top LCC Jeju Air will offer a one-time chartered flight to Manado and Batam, two leading tourist destinations in Indonesia. Air Busan from May 3 to October 28 will run two chartered flights a week on the route between Busan and the Philippine resort island of Boracay.

Air Seoul from April 28 will add chartered flights to Japan's Tottori Prefecture, following those to Sapporo that ended last month. Eastar Jet, which resumed operations last month, is also mulling adding aircraft.

"Plans are in place for expanding irregular flights focused on Asian routes popular among domestic travelers," an aviation industry source said. "By adding irregular flights, LCCs can especially take advantage of additional points in the evaluation of 'charter flight performance' when air traffic rights are allocated."

With the growth of demand for air travel, expectations of improved LCC earnings are also growing, with China considered a key factor. Each airline is expected to exceed an occupancy rate of 80%, the break-even point, if the normalization of Chinese routes speeds up.

Write to Mi-Sun Kang at misunny@hankyung.com