Auckland International Airport Ltd., the national gateway, saw a jump in international visitor arrivals in May, lead by increased traffic on Cairns and Singaporean routes.

International arrival numbers rose 9.2% to 595,136 in the month, compared to the same months a year ago, with Australian traffic to Auckland up 8.5% due to additional capacity on the Auckland-Cairns route. Traffic from Singapore rose 53.9% after Jetstar Asia added 19,700 seats to the market.

That’s a further improvement on the airport’s operations in April, when international arrival numbers rose 6.4%.

The operations figures contrast with the government’s short-term numbers, which show the number of visitor arrivals fell 0.4% to 141,300 in May, according to Statistics New Zealand, with 2,900 few Korean and 1,400 Japanese arrivals in the month.

Domestic passenger numbers returned to growth in May, increased by 1.3% to 473,013 compared to the same month a year ago, partly reflecting a 2.2% capacity decrease compared to May 2010.

International passenger numbers through Queenstown rose 53.2% this financial year on a 50.0% increase in aircraft movements, primarily driven by Jetstar’s expanded operations, the airport said.

New Zealanders travelling in May rose 19.7%, with the strength offsetting the continuing weakness in Japanese and Korean arrivals following the recent earthquakes in Japan and Christchurch.

Auckland Airport shares fell 0.2% to $2.24 this morning, and have gained 2.8% so far this year.

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