Kelowna, B.C.’s airport exceeded two million passengers in 2023, a noticeable increase from the year before.
On Friday, the City of Kelowna called it an exciting milestone, saying it’s “a sign of recovery for the aviation sector.”
Last year, YLW saw 2,032,624 people pass through its gates, an increase of 18 per cent from 2022.
“As one of the country’s fastest recovering airports, YLW is an important economic driver for our community,” Mayor Tom Dyas said.
“I am very encouraged to see this high growth rate of passengers travelling through YLW and the benefits that will have to our entire region.”
Kelowna’s airport is the 10th busiest in the nation and has more than 200 one-stop connections and 21 non-stop domestic and international destinations.
Six years ago, in 2018, the airport exceeded two million passengers for the first time, with 2,059,030. In 2019, that number slightly fell to 2,032,019.
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However, in 2020, numbers dropped harshly during the pandemic to 737,447, though they’ve been slowly increasing since.
In 2022, the airport saw 1,718,059 passengers.
“This is a tremendous milestone for YLW and our region, demonstrating the strong demand for air travel to and from the Okanagan, as well as the confidence and trust that our passengers have in the airport,” airport CEO Sam Samaddar said.
“I would like to thank our community for their continued support of YLW.”
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