A strike at Air France and the demonstrations which closed Bangkok’s international airport meant BAA’s seven UK airports handled one million fewer passengers than in the same month last year.

The seven airports, including London's Heathrow, Gatwick and Stansted, handled just 9.8 million passengers during the month — 8.9 per cent down on the 10.8 million using the airports in November last year.

BAA, which is owned by Spanish construction giant, Ferrovial, said the continued economic downturn had also played a part in hitting demand for air travel.

It said all of its key markets had been affected, most significantly European charter traffic, which fell by 17 per cent in what is traditionally its quietest period.

Domestic traffic was down by 12.7 per cent, European scheduled routes by 9.1 per cent and North Atlantic routes by 9.2 per cent. Other long haul services were relatively resilient and down by just 3.1 per cent.

Of the individual airports Gatwick, which BAA is currently trying to sell, was the worst affected of the firm’s English airports - with passenger numbers down 13.5 per cent on November last year.

The company blamed this on the “negative impacts” of Open Skies, the treaty which allows EU and US carriers more flexibility on transatlantic routes, and “further airline contractions”.

It said Stansted airport, where passenger numbers were down 13.2 per cent on November last year, also experienced the effects of airline service cutbacks.

In Scotland, BAA said Glasgow airport’s passenger numbers were down 15.6 per cent on November last year, with Aberdeen down 11.5 per cent and Edinburgh down 7.8 per cent.

BAA insisted the figures were “almost precisely” in line with the 9 per cent drop in air transport as a whole during the month.

It added: “BAA expects, on the evidence of historic economic downturns and the resulting effect on air traffic, that the long-term prospects for growth remain good and that passenger volumes will recover in due course.”

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