Dubai International Airport Sees Record 92.3 million Passengers in 2024

People queue at the check-in counter at the Dubai International Airport, in Dubai, United Arab Emirates, April 17, 2024. REUTERS/Staff/File Photo
People queue at the check-in counter at the Dubai International Airport, in Dubai, United Arab Emirates, April 17, 2024. REUTERS/Staff/File Photo
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Dubai International Airport Sees Record 92.3 million Passengers in 2024

People queue at the check-in counter at the Dubai International Airport, in Dubai, United Arab Emirates, April 17, 2024. REUTERS/Staff/File Photo
People queue at the check-in counter at the Dubai International Airport, in Dubai, United Arab Emirates, April 17, 2024. REUTERS/Staff/File Photo

Dubai International Airport, the world's busiest for international travel, saw a record 92.3 million passengers pass through its terminals in 2024, officials announced Thursday.

The result cements Dubai's bounce-back from the coronavirus pandemic, surpassing the previous record set in 2018 for the first time. Today, the airport feels like it's bursting at the seams with aircraft movements and crowds moving through its terminals, The AP reported.

Authorities plan to move operations in 2032 to the city-state's second airport after a nearly $35 billion upgrade.

Dubai's ruler, Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum, first announced the new passenger figure on X. The state-owned airport is home to the long-haul carrier Emirates, which powers the network of state-owned and state-linked businesses known as "Dubai Inc."

“Dubai is the airport of the world ... and a new world in the aviation sector,” Sheikh Mohammed wrote.

Speaking with The Associated Press, Dubai Airports CEO Paul Griffiths pointed to the fact that the airport had served more than 700 million passengers over the last decade — closing in on twice the population of the United States.

The 2024 result “is not only a record for us, of course, but as the No. 1 airport in the world, it’s a new world record for international passengers through any airport in the world," Griffiths said. "And the great thing is that’s with two runways on a very limited geographical footprint, which hasn’t really changed at all.”

In 2023, the airport, known as DXB, had 86.9 million passengers. Its 2019, traffic was 86.3 million passengers. It had 89.1 million passengers in 2018 — its previous busiest-ever year before the pandemic, while 66 million passengers passed through in 2022.

In 2024, India remained the top destination market for DXB, with 12 million passengers. Saudi Arabia followed with 7.6 million and the United Kingdom at 6.2 million. DXB and Al Maktoum International Airport, known as DWC, serve 106 airlines flying to 272 cities in 107 countries across the world.



EU Sees €28 Billion Hit from Trump’s Steel, Aluminum Tariffs

FILED - 12 July 2020, Lower Saxony, Salzgitter: An employee walks along coiled steel at Salzgitter AG. Photo: Julian Stratenschulte/dpa
FILED - 12 July 2020, Lower Saxony, Salzgitter: An employee walks along coiled steel at Salzgitter AG. Photo: Julian Stratenschulte/dpa
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EU Sees €28 Billion Hit from Trump’s Steel, Aluminum Tariffs

FILED - 12 July 2020, Lower Saxony, Salzgitter: An employee walks along coiled steel at Salzgitter AG. Photo: Julian Stratenschulte/dpa
FILED - 12 July 2020, Lower Saxony, Salzgitter: An employee walks along coiled steel at Salzgitter AG. Photo: Julian Stratenschulte/dpa

The European Union estimates that the first wave of Donald Trump’s steel and aluminum tariffs will hit as much as €28 billion ($29.3 billion) of the bloc’s exports in what would be a massive escalation in the US president’s trade war, Bloomberg reported.

The amount of goods — which the EU assesses will include derivative products as well — would be about four times larger than the last time Trump targeted the bloc’s metals sector, according to people familiar with the EU’s thinking.

EU trade chief Maros Sefcovic debriefed the bloc’s ambassadors on Friday after his visit to Washington to meet with his US counterparts. He cautioned that the situation is in flux and the details and the scope of any tariffs could still change, said the people, who spoke on the condition of anonymity.

As part of his effort to rewrite global trade rules, Trump announced a series of duties including 25% tariffs on steel and aluminum exports that could take effect as soon as March 12. He’s also announced reciprocal tariffs based on policies of partners that are seen as obstacles to US trade.

The European Commission, which has authority over EU trade actions, declined to comment.

For the EU, the fight over American metals tariffs started in 2018 during Trump’s first term, when the US hit nearly $7 billion of European steel and aluminum exports with duties, citing national security concerns. At the time, officials in Brussels scoffed at the notion that the EU posed such a threat.

In that first salvo, the US hit steel goods with 25% tariffs and aluminum with 10%, and included exemptions for certain products. Bloomberg reported earlier that this time around, no exemptions were planned.

The 27-nation bloc retaliated by targeting politically sensitive companies with retaliatory duties, including Harley-Davidson Inc. motorcycles and Levi Strauss & Co. jeans. The measures were applied product-by-product and included agricultural goods and apparel in addition to steel and aluminum products.

The two sides agreed to a temporary truce in 2021, when the US partly removed its measures and introduced a set of tariff-rate quotas above which duties on the metals are applied, while the EU froze all of its restrictive measures.

The EU has said that it would respond quickly and proportionally to US tariffs and could reactivate as a first step the lists previously suspended. The commission has been preparing various lists with different sectors and goods targeted with the principle of causing more harm on the American side, including in sensitive constituencies, Bloomberg previously reported.

The commission has said that unfreezing the suspended tariffs, which are on pause until the end of March, could be done quickly.

Sefcovic, who met with US Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick, Jamieson Greer, his pick for US trade representative and National Economic Council Director Kevin Hassett this past week, told EU envoys that the atmosphere was positive but no negotiations were conducted yet, said the people.

According to Bloomberg, Sefcovic said he used the meeting as a first point of contact to open the channels of communication and to try to debunk claims by the Americans that he said were false, including that Europe’s value added tax is unfair to the US, they said.

In order to avoid a trade clash, Sefcovic offered to his American counterparts a deal to lower tariffs on industrial goods, including cars, one of Trump’s longstanding demands.