REVENUES FROM military traffic at Shannon airport are not expected to drop significantly despite the end of US military involvement in Iraq.
The airport, which handled 1.8 million passengers last year, is estimated to be losing about € 8 million annually.
But while an estimated 229,000 US military personnel – up to an eighth of overall passenger numbers – passed through the facility in 2010, it is understood the majority of those relate to US activity in Afghanistan and Kuwait and the withdrawal from Iraq will not greatly affect airport revenues.
The Department of Transport yesterday confirmed that flights containing military personnel that transit through Shannon “pay normal airport charges”.
In addition to revenues earned from airport fees paid by transiting US military aircraft, it is understood troops passing through the airport are regular customers of the duty free shop.
The airport this week unveiled a €1 million revamp of its duty free shop including an upgrade to the perfume and cosmetics area, the installation of a dedicated Irish whiskey store, an Irish Memories souvenir outlet, a new giftware store and an Irish food area.
Retail executives for the airport said the revamp would “radically improve” the shopping experience at Shannon and “grow sales”.
Asked yesterday how a drop-off in Iraq-related passenger numbers would affect revenues, a spokesman for the airport declined to comment saying that questions relating to US military activity were a matter for the Government.
Sources close to the airport, however, last night downplayed the effect of the withdrawal from Iraq on the airport’s revenues. The source said the bulk of military traffic through the airport is now to Afghanistan with troops also flying to Kuwait and US military bases in Germany. The source described the end of the war as “not a big hit” to the airport.
However figures from anti-war activists Shannonwatch, which monitors military flights into and out of Irish airspace at Shannon, show that the number of US military flights through the airport was down slightly in October compared to previous months.
Shannonwatch recorded 47 commercial airlines carrying US troops at the airport in the month, compared to 75 in September and 74 in August. It is not known if the reduction in troop numbers relate to the pull-out from Iraq. The organisation’s spokesman, John Lannon, said: “We’re concerned from Shannon airport’s point of view as a viable and sustainable entity that the reliance on US military traffic is hugely problematic.”
However Mr Lannon downplayed the impact of the end of the Iraq war on the airport saying: “We know from talking to soldiers in uniform in the airport in the last few years that most of them have been going to Afghanistan.”
A spokesman for the Department of Foreign Affairs yesterday said it had not received an advance briefing by US authorities about an ending of its Iraq-related activities at Shannon.
