THE ASAHI SHIMBUN
April 22, 2023 at 18:46 JST
Japan Airlines and All Nippon Airways aircraft at Tokyo's Haneda Airport (Asahi Shimbun file photo)
A surge in bookings for domestic flights during the Golden Week national holidays heralds a return to pre-COVID-19 levels.
Japan Airlines Co. (JAL) and All Nippon Airways Co. (ANA) on April 21 announced the status of reservations for the period between April 29 and May 7.
ANA said it had 932,000 reservations for domestic flights, an increase of 32 percent over 2022, while JAL had 827,000 reservations, an increase of 14.2 percent.
Compared to 2018, prior to the novel coronavirus pandemic, ANA’s reservations this year, including group company Peach Aviation Ltd., are about 90 percent of the figure five years ago. While the dates are slightly different, JAL’s reservations are very close to those of 2018.
Officials said the weaker yen. coupled with higher fuel surcharges for international flights, kept reservations for overseas trips at about 60 percent of the level five years ago.
Still, ANA had 152,000 reservations, about 2.7 times that of 2022, while JAL had 146,000 reservations, a 2.4-fold increase.
Similar trends were found in surveys by travel agencies.
A survey of about 20,000 people by JTB Corp. found that 26.5 percent of respondents said they would or likely take at least an overnight domestic trip during Golden Week. The result marked an increase of 9.3 percentage points over 2022.
Based on hotel reservations and other factors, JTB estimated that 24.5 million people would make domestic trips over Golden Week, an increase not only over 2019, before the COVID-19 health scare, but the highest level since 2000.
Only 13.2 percent of respondents cited COVID-19 for not traveling during Golden Week, a decrease of 26.2 percentage points over last year.
Overseas travel is not expected to recover to 2019 levels anytime soon, however.
While reservations as of April 5 were about 20 times higher than in 2022, H.I.S. Co. said the figure was still only about 30 percent of the 2019 level.
(This article was written by Go Takahashi and Shinya Matsumoto.)
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