Chattanooga Airport continues to build back air traffic that disappeared during the pandemic with passenger boardings up nearly 15% last year over 2021, but the results still lag pre-coronavirus numbers.
Also, if flights during the Christmas holiday period seemed crowded in Chattanooga, that’s because they were. Delta Air Lines, historically the busiest carrier in the city, filled 88.4% of its available seats this past month at the airport, up from 81.7% in December 2021, figures show.
The airport’s final 2022 boardings came in at 432,312 passengers, according to Lovell Field. While up sharply, the level is still 21.9% behind the all-time annual mark of 554,050 boardings in 2019 in Chattanooga.
Jim Hall, the Airport Authority’s chairman, said by phone that he’s very pleased with 2022 and that the airport is “headed back to a better normal.”