Pictures of the Flight Radar Foundation, which specializes in flight tracking, showed a significant decline in air traffic worldwide, including in the Arab Gulf region, with more countries and airlines suspending flights in compliance with regulatory directives or operational requirements issued by governments and authorities around the world in The framework to address the spread of the emerging coronavirus (Covid-19).
According to the Foundation’s data, about 75 international airlines have suspended all their flights, including 12 Arab airlines, in addition to 41 other companies that reduced their operations by rates of up to 95% in response to the continuing restrictions and declining levels of travel demand.
According to the international provider of airports and airline data, "OAG": The number of scheduled seats in the air transport sector globally decreased by 21 million in only one week, and by 29% starting from March 24 this year compared to the previous week of March 16.
Seat capacity in Western Europe decreased by 53% in just 7 days, compared to 42% in Latin America and 33% in the Middle East region, with some markets posting unprecedented levels of cuts as the temporary suspension decisions came into effect.
In turn, "Ryanair", the largest European airline in terms of passenger numbers, reduced its scheduled seats by 83% as of March 24 compared to the previous week of March 16, and about 82% for Scandinavian Airlines and 75% for Iberia Airlines, compared to about 70% for Lufthansa.