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As we note each year at this time in October, as the leaves start falling, the planes are flying.
Travis Kuhn, senior vice president of market intelligence for ARUGS Analytics, has attributed a perfect storm of reasoning for October being the busiest month for business aircraft activity: A 31-day month, no major holidays and most of the lower 48 is generally snow-free. Generally, it's a good time to fly.
With that in mind, it was expected for October to fare better than September for bizjet flight activity in the latest ARGUS TRAQPak report, and it did. However, the slight year-to-year gain that analysts forecast one month ago did not materialize.
"Business aircraft activity remains stubbornly stable," Kuhn said in a statement late Friday as the numbers were announced. "We expected activity to move into positive territory in October but ultimately saw 309,000 flights in North America, compared to the 316,000 we had forecasted. It was still a very strong month and we expect that November will finally move into positive territory but we'll monitor that closely." That 7,000-flight difference accounts for a 2.3% miss between projection and reality. The forecast year-to-year gain of 0.4% for North American flights in October ended up being a 1.9% decrease.
The silver lining in the not-quite-blue sky is that the positive month-over-month trends and predictions for the future leave room for optimism.PREVIOUS STORIES:One quarter to go - How will the business aircraft market wrap up the year? August business aircraft flights dipped lower than predicted, still far ahead of pre-COVID numbersFractional activity remained the only positive segment, with a notable 13.4% year-over-year increase, building on the 9.2% year-over-year gain that the operational category accumulated in September that itself came after a 7.9% jump from 2022 in August.In short, fractional remains hot and is carrying the weight that is burdening other segments. Elsewhere for October year-to-year numbers, Part 135 activity decreased by 6.0%, largely due to sluggish activity in the light jets and turboprops segment. The Part 91 market also experienced a decline of 3.5%, mainly attributed to a 7.9% decrease in mid-size cabin activity.
By aircraft size for the month, large cabin jets recorded the largest increase, up by 2.5%. Mid-size cabin aircraft increased by 0.4%, while small-cabin aircraft dropped by 2.7%. The turboprop market reported the largest drop in activity, finishing down by 5.8%. Despite these declines, five individual segments reported year-over-year increases, with all four fractional segments showing positive trends. The most substantial increase was noted in the Fractional turboprop market, up by an impressive 17.1% year over year.
Compared to September, business aviation flight activity finished up 6.4%. Even after adjusting for differences in calendar days, October averaged nearly 300 more flights per day. All operational categories reported positive results for the month. Fractional activity, in particular, stood out with the largest increase, rising by 10.0% from September. Part 91 activity increased by 6.6%, and Part 135 activity showed a 4.5% increase.
Among the FAA regions, the southern migration has begun. Reflecting changing weather patterns, the Southern region posted the most significant monthly increase in activity, up by 23.0%, while the Northwest region recorded the largest decrease, down by 13.7%. Activity in Canada and the Caribbean combined to increase by 8.9% month over month from September, largely due to a 78% monthly increase in Caribbean flying.RELATED GLOBALAIR.COM FEATURE: Get average FBO fuel prices by U.S. region
In contrast to North America, European flight activity continued to operate in a normal rhythm but remained down from 2022. October 2023 saw activity in Europe decrease by 7.2% from last year. However, it is expected that activity on the continent will improve during November.
For next month, ARGUS TRAQPak analysts estimate that there will be a 0.7% increase in overall North American flight activity year over year. In contrast, European activity is estimated to decrease by 1.2%.Kuhn's phrasing of "stubbornly stable" seems to mirror the plateauing of the current preowned aircraft sales market that has taken hold in the post-pandemic fervor. For now, the "new normal" of the bizjet world appears to be stronger than the "normal" of before. And that looks to remain the case as we wrap up the year.