The ongoing political protests by ant-government “red-shirt” protesters is expected to have no affect on the number of people passing through Bangkok Suvarnabhumi International Airport during the forthcoming Songkran (Thai New Year) holidays.

Despite the declaration of a state of emergency by the government and the continued peaceful rally by thousands of protesters in the heart of Bangkok, Airports of Thailand (AoT) said it expects passenger throughput between April 9 and 18 to increase by 3.74 percent over the same period last year, reaching a daily average of 130,000.

According to the AoT, airlines flying into Bangkok have requested an additional 558 flight slots – 486 international and 72 domestic – for the 10 day holiday period.

Nirandra Theeranartsin, general manager of Suvarnabhumi International Airport, said the increased traffic reflected the low risk assessment airlines had reached that the airport will be seized by anti-government protesters as it was by the “yellow-shirts” in 2008.

“People feel confident that the red-shirt protesters are not inclined to lay siege to, or seize the airport, as the yellow-shirt protesters did in 2008 and that the government has sufficient security arrangements inlace to ensure such an event won’t occur again”, he said.

Mr. Nirandra said the ongoing protests, aimed at forcing a house dissolution and fresh round of elections, has so far had no impact on aircraft or passenger movements and in the first four days of April aircraft movements had increased by 3.85 percent over the same period last year.

From April 1 to April 4 Mr. Nirandra said Suvarnabhumi had handled 3,047 flights, with international movements up by 5.24 percent to 2,168 and domestic aircraft movements up by 0.57 percent to 879.

The number of passengers passing through the airport for the same period had also increased compared to the same period in 2009, with 383,729 international passengers, an increase of 9.27 percent, and 122,235 domestic passengers, or an increase of 1.77 percent.

Mr. Nirandra said that while tourists are still flying into Thailand in increasing numbers, many were bypassing Bangkok and catching connecting flights straight to destinations such as Phuket, Krabi, and Koh Samui.

He said many Thais were fed up with the ongoing political unrest and were using the Songkran holidays to visit friends and relatives in Japan, South Korea, and Europe.

By John Le Fevre

Thailand Travel News for April 9, 2010