new delhi this sunday october 9 saw the highest number of domestic flyers since the outbreak of covid in march 2020 the aviation ministry said just over 4 lakh 402697 to be precise flew within the country that day on 2732 domestic flights on this recovery in air traffic prime minister narendra modi tweeted great sign our focus is to further improve connectivity across india which is important for ease of living and economic progressunion aviation minister jyotiraditya scindia tweeted on the road to full recovery the indian civil aviation has not only hit the 4lakh daily passengers mark but also achieved the highest ever numbers since precovid 19 era way to go indiafor the last few months steep airfares due to record high aviation turbine fuel atf prices and record low rupeedollar exchange rate meant that the daily domestic air traffic was stuck way below the 4lakh mark airlines were expecting a recovery in air travel after dussehra and see this uptick in travel continuing till early january before the lean travel quarter janmarch kicks in after the first super sunday postcovid domestic air traffic went below the 4lakh mark the next day as is usually the case post weekendsrating agency icra estimates domestic passenger traffic for aprilseptember 2022 at about 63 crore a yoy growth of about 111 and lower by only 11 compared to precovid aprilseptember 2019 airlines capacity deployment in september 2022 was about 27 higher than september 2021 and lower by about 9 than precovid levels it is estimated that domestic aviation industry operated at a passenger load factor of about 84 in september 2022 against about 73 in september 2021 and nearly 86 in september 2019 the international passenger traffic for indian carriers in september 2022 strongly surpassed the precovid level of 251 lakh by 34 rating agency icras vp suprio banerjee saidhowever despite the strong traffic over next three months the challenges for airlines remain with some struggling to survive a steady rise in prices of atf and a general inflationary environment continue to dampen the industry earnings with atf prices in october 2022 higher by 60 compared to october 2021 while airlines have been increasing yields airfares in icras view the same has not been adequate to offset the impact of the rising atf prices banerjee saidwhile domestic air travel is expected to recover to precovid levels this fiscal earnings recovery for domestic airlines will be slowpaced due to elevated atf prices in addition to the rupee depreciation against the us dollar amid a heightened competitive environment the icra official added