Air Malta and Ryanair aircraft based in Malta are occupying 16 parking stands at Malta International Airport, with others being used by several maintenance and repair organisations, a spokeswoman said.

The national air carrier has a fleet of 10 aeroplanes. Ryanair’s subsidy, Malta Air, has over 60 aircraft registered in Malta though, of course, not all are based on the island.

Given that MIA boasts of 28 aircraft parking stands, the ones in use may not seem too many. However, people in the industry know that every aircraft that is not flying means loss of income for its owners, operators and all those that somehow benefit from the business it generates, including airports.

“This situation is completely unprecedented and cannot be compared to the Libyan uprising or past crises,” the MIA spokeswoman said.

MIA had reported that, between 21st February 2011, when two Libyan Air Force fighter pilots defected to Malta, and 28th February, 212 aircraft movements were directly related to the emergency due to the situation in Libya. Seventy of the movements involved commercial airliners, 92 military aircraft belonging to various air forces, and 50 being small private aircraft.

Although MIA has yet to publish statistics on airport movements in March, it has already declared a 38 per cent drop in traffic in the first 17 days of the month when compared to a year earlier.

“Our aim in the current situation is to remain operational and flexible enough to be able to support any government requests relating to repatriation or cargo flights,” the MIA spokeswoman said.