Conditions improve for airports.

AIRPORTS operator BAA said the recovery in market conditions continued last month after figures showed it handled 13 million passengers, a fall of 2.6% on last year.

The decline is similar to the performances in July and August and comes six months after traffic across its seven airports slumped by 11.3%.

Heathrow saw a marginal decrease of 0.3% to 5.8 million passengers in September, but a 5% fall in aircraft movements meant the load factor on planes rose to 78.2% from 73.9% a year earlier.

BAA said strong demand on long-haul routes to India and the Middle East drove the resilient performance.

Gatwick's passenger numbers were down by 0.5% but this represented the airport's best performance since May 2008 as domestic and European scheduled markets showed strong growth. At Stansted, an 11% reduction in seat capacity following service withdrawals by low-cost carriers resulted in a decrease in passenger numbers of 11.8%. Edinburgh airport's numbers grew for the sixth successive month -by 3.8% - as a result of new low-cost scheduled European services.

Glasgow declined by 8.9% and Aberdeen by 5.3% - both improved rates -while Southampton recorded a 4.6% drop. BAA said today's figures offered signs of encouragement for the industry.

It added: "In March this year, traffic across the UK airports was down 11.3%, so recent figures suggest that there are some signs of a recovery."