Alaska Airlines May Traffic Declines 7.5 Percent

SEATTLE (AP) — Alaska Air Group Inc. said Wednesday its May passenger traffic fell 7.5 percent on its main carrier, Alaska Airlines.

Alaska Airlines flew 1.5 billion revenue passenger miles, down from 1.62 billion in the same month of 2008. A revenue passenger mile is a widely watched industry measurement accounting for one paying passenger flown one mile.

Capacity, or available seat miles, declined 6.3 percent to 1.95 billion from 2.08 billion.

Load factor, or occupancy, rose to 76.8 percent from 77.8 percent.

So far this year, traffic fell 7.3 percent to 7.71 million, capacity slipped 8.5 percent to $10.2 billion and load factor increased to 76.6 percent from 75.6 percent.

Alaska Air said its subsidiary Horizon Air flew 199 million revenue passenger miles in May, down 15.1 percent from 234 million a year earlier.

Capacity last month decreased 12.9 percent to 277 million available seat miles from 318 million in the year-ago period, while load factor dropped to 71.7 percent from 73.6 percent.

Year-to-date, Horizon Air has seen its traffic fall 17.9 percent, its capacity drop 15.1 percent, and its load factor decrease to 68.2 percent from 70.5 percent.

Shares of Alaska Air Group lost 24 cents to $16.02 in afternoon trading.