In 2019 there were 9,516,588 scheduled commercial flight arrivals at airports across the USA. The five most popular US states for flight arrivals were California (1,008,373 – 11%), Texas – 906,990 (9.5%), Florida – 745,613 (7.8%), Illinois – 566,258 (6.0%) and New York – 521,942 (5.5%). Therefore, with all this market activity happening it leads to several important questions: how do you track the number of flights by state? How many flights is an airline making into a state? Most importantly, do you truly know arrival information for your state or country? In this overview, Cirium reflects on these 2019 figures and provides three best practices for governments to apply in 2020.
1. Proactive not reactive public health and contagion monitoring
The world has been rocked by major health scares, notably the Sars outbreak in 2003, Ebola between 2014 and 2016 and in early 2020 the world was battling to contain a new strain of Coronavirus. The aviation industry is acutely aware of the risks that it could play in spreading a novel viral strain. On 31st Jan, Cirium published figures to confirm that nearly 10,000 flights had been cancelled because of the latest outbreak. Therefore, as a government official or employee your ability to understand the start and end location of any flight entering your airspace is critical. It will allow you to plan effectively to ensure the appropriate screening takes place for flights arriving from high risk areas.
2. Use aviation big data to spot historical trends that helps your customs teams
In addition to protecting citizens from the risk of public health concerns, governments require live tracking of aircraft by MSN or airline to determine routes that could facilitate activity of a criminal nature. Due to the large volume of flights entering and departing your airspace it can be difficult to manage resources effectively. In Texas, 2019 figures show 906,990 flight arrivals, 371,188 of these flights were operated by American Airlines and 235,048 by United Airlines. Therefore, over 50% of flights arriving into one state were by two airlines. Do you know the market share breakdown by airline for your state or country? If no, then it is unlikely that you will know a breakdown of routes and traffic entering your legislative remit. This makes it challenging to manage your border and customs team effectively.
3. Recover unpaid tax revenue ahead of time
Effective revenue management is fundamental for governments in 2020. Do you know the amount of flights entering your airspace? In 2019, Cirium data shows that the state of New York saw 521,942 flight arrivals, 5.5% of overall US activity.
Top 5 airlines arriving into New York state in 2019:
Delta Air Lines – 188,163
American Airlines – 114,629
Jetblue – 75,685
United Airlines – 34,299
Southwest Airlines – 27,621
Understanding the exact number of flights arriving per airport will allow you to forecast revenue from airlines in 2020.
Cirium’s aviation data and analytics can help you in 2020:
Analyze and segment flights relevant to you by arrival and departure time from a possible total of 3.3 million a month, sourced from a database that aggregates and validates information from over 600 sources of real-time flight status information. Find out more about how we’re helping governments around the world here.
