Business aircraft flights deflate as 2024 kicks off, can the Super Bowl help them rally?

Image: Twitter.com / @StrictlyChristoFrom winter storms to a nearly 10% year-to-year drop in Part 135 flights, business aircraft activity has stumbled out of the gate for 2024. That's according to the January ARGUS TRAQPak report. The latest weekly data from WINGX show a similar swing.The numbers from ARGUS Analytics show an overall global dip of 4.3% for January compared to last year, and a 5.5% slide from December, which is historically driven higher than other winter months due to holiday travel. The North American market posted frostier numbers, down 5.5% year to year and 6.6% from December. "We have seen a recent trend of activity missing expectations and January was no different," said Travis Kuhn, senior vice president of software for ARGUS. "We observed a post-holiday slowdown, which we expected but the winter weather impacts were a little stronger than anticipated for the month. We would expect February to be stronger with the Super Bowl and President's Day weekend, both of which typically produce strong activity numbers."Speaking of the Super Bowl ... Widespread media reports show that Las Vegas was a madhouse for the championship NFL game. In addition to setting record numbers for TV viewers, those who made the trip to watch the game in person packed the area airports, and those who missed their slots, especially on departures according to Forbes, were left waiting hours if not until the following day to exit Sin City. WINGX noted that airports near Super Bowl destinations have historically seen as much as five times higher traffic volume. Richard Koe of WINGX said ahead of the event that he expected it to be a record-breaker. Business Insider is backing up those claims, saying the number of jets that flew to the game could be around 1,500. The weekly Global Market Tracker published just ahead of the Super Bowl by WINGX noted that despite air traffic being down to kick off 2024, down 4% year to date in the US as of Feb. 4, transatlantic traffic was up 2%. "The year has got off to a relatively slow start compared to the beginning of 2023, notwithstanding the market was still seeing unprecedented peaks in activity 12 months ago," Koe said last week. "And there are still parts of the market seeing very strong activity, such as transatlantic, also US domestic fractional flying."January flight activity by segment Broken down by segment, ARGUS data show that activity among fractional operators posted the only gain in January, up 9.4% year to year, while Part 91 flights dropped 6.7% and Part 135 finished down 9.8%, with three out of four of the aircraft size categories posting double-digit percentage losses. Mid-size cabins fared better, with only a 1.8% slide.RELATED STORIES: While commercial air travel set a holiday record, December business flights remained ho-ho-humbug Forecasting the business jet market for an unpredictable 2024 - here are the latest insights from JETNET The business aircraft market is normalizing and that might be goodThe biggest winner was in the fractional small-cabin market, up 14.7% year over year. Regionally, all eight FAA segments in the US posted lower numbers than in December, an ongoing trend. The Pacific Northwest saw the only climb to close 2023 but was down 1.2% to kick off the new year, the lowest percentage drop among the regions. Europe remains down but stable, according to ARGUS - dipping 7.9% in what is among the slowest months for bizav flights on the continent, seasonally. For February, ARGUS TRAQPak analysts forecast a 1.2% increase in North American flight activity year over year, with European activity estimated to decrease by 2.7%.