Airport surpasses 8 million mark in 2007

Southwest Florida International Airport accommodated more than 8 million passengers during 2007, making it the busiest year in the airport's history. "2007 was definitely a notable year for Southwest Florida International Airport," said Robert M. Ball, executive director of the Lee County Port Authority. "It is the first time that we have exceeded 8 million annual passengers and that is a significant achievement for the airport."

Last year, passenger traffic was up over 5.3 percent compared to 2006. For the month of December, nearly 689,000 passengers traveled through the airport, a decrease of 5.1 percent compared to December 2006.

The traffic leader for the month of December was AirTran with 83,213 passengers traveling to and from Fort Myers. Rounding out the top five were JetBlue (82,763), Delta (73,997), Continental (63,947) and Southwest (62,921).

At Southwest Florida International Airport, there were 8,373 aircraft movements (takeoffs and landings) recorded, a decrease of 2.4 percent over December 2006. Page Field General Aviation Airport saw 6,555 movements. In addition, over 3.5 million pounds of air freight moved through both airports in December 2007.

Southwest Florida International Airport is one of the 50 busiest U.S. airports. For more information, log onto www.flylcpa.com.