10 thousand departures of foreign passengers in September
Departures of foreign passengers from Iceland via Keflavik airport were about 10 thousand in September, according to figures from the Icelandic Tourist Board, or less than 94.5 percent compared to the numbers in September 2019, when departures were 184 thousand.
Decrease of departures by 70.6%
Since the beginning of the year, 461 thousand foreign passengers have departed from Iceland via Keflavík Airport, which is a decrease of 70.6% compared to the same period last year but then the total departures were 1.6 million.
Huge decline in foreign visits
It is hardly necessary to say much about the reasons for the decline in the number of foreign visitors to the country in recent months, but ever since the effects of the Covid epidemic began to be felt, there has been a collapse in the number of departures. Thus, the year-on-year contraction was:
- 53% in March
- 99% in April and May
- 97% in June
- 80% in July
- 75% in August
- 95% in september.
Tourists by nationalities in September
Of each individual nation, most departures in August were due to Germans, but their departures were 2,147 or 85% less than in September last year. In second place were the Poles with about 1,700 departures, which were about as many as last year. is necessary to keep in mind that many Poles live and work in Iceland and are included in these numbers.
Third were the British (7.1% of total departures), French (5.2%), Danes (4.0%), Dutch (3.9%), Swiss (3.5%), USA (3,4%), Spanish (3,3%) and the Baltic countries (3.3). In total, the departures of the ten largest nations were 72.2%.
Icelanders' travels abroad
About 4,900 Icelanders went abroad in September or 90.1% less than in September 2019. Since the beginning of the year (January-September), about 121 thousand Icelanders have gone abroad, but there are 345 thousand fewer departures than in the same period last year.
Further Information
Further division between nations can be seen in the table below and under Numbers of foreign visitors here on the web.
