Hong Kong International Is World’s 8th Largest Airport

By Douglas A. McIntyre Updated Jan 11, 4:57AM EST · Published Aug 14, 4:52AM EDT

Follow 24/7 Wall St. on Google

This post may contain links from our sponsors and affiliates, and Flywheel Publishing may receive compensation for actions taken through them.

Hong Kong International Is World’s 8th Largest Airport — © Pavliha / Getty Images

Hong Kong International Airport, shuttered by protests, is the world’s eighth largest, as measured by passengers per year. In 2017, it handled 74,517,402, slightly fewer than London’s Heathrow. And it is the hub for travel across much of Asia.

Hong Kong is critical to traffic for several of the world’s largest airlines. As long as it is closed, it will affect their revenue and clog their systems, backing up both planes and passenger traffic. It is the home to Cathay Pacific and is a central airport for China Eastern Airlines. Singapore Airlines, Ethiopian Airlines, Air India, British Airways, American Airlines, KLM, Lufthansa, Qantas and United: there are no alternative hubs for most of these carriers.

The airport could be closed for a long time. The Wall Street Journal said of the Hong Kong airport protests: “Outbound and inbound flights resumed Wednesday morning. Hong Kong’s airport authority said Wednesday it had secured a court injunction ‘to restrain persons from unlawfully and wilfully obstructing’ the airport’s activities.” However, the airport remains a major target for protestors, and it is likely it will be a center of disruption again.

[nativounit]

The Wall Street Journal added:

The day’s spiraling violence showed how volatile the protests are becoming. Hong Kong authorities have begun to respond more severely, with business leaders and officials offering stronger support to quell the unrest as it starts to damage Hong Kong’s economy and its global reputation as a safe place to do business.

The major carriers that use the airport are not out of trouble.

[recirclink id=568346]

[wallst_email_signup]

About the Author Douglas A. McIntyre →

Douglas A. McIntyre is the co-founder, chief executive officer and editor in chief of 24/7 Wall St. and 24/7 Tempo. He has held these jobs since 2006.

McIntyre has written thousands of articles for 24/7 Wall St. He is an expert on corporate finance, the automotive industry, media companies and international finance. He has edited articles on national demographics, sports, personal income and travel.

His work has been quoted or mentioned in The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, Los Angeles Times, The Washington Post, NBC News, Time, The New Yorker, HuffPost USA Today, Business Insider, Yahoo, AOL, MarketWatch, The Atlantic, Bloomberg, New York Post, Chicago Tribune, Forbes, The Guardian and many other major publications. McIntyre has been a guest on CNBC, the BBC and television and radio stations across the country.

A magna cum laude graduate of Harvard College, McIntyre also was president of The Harvard Advocate. Founded in 1866, the Advocate is the oldest college publication in the United States.

TheStreet.com, Comps.com and Edgar Online are some of the public companies for which McIntyre served on the board of directors. He was a Vicinity Corporation board member when the company was sold to Microsoft in 2002. He served on the audit committees of some of these companies.

McIntyre has been the CEO of FutureSource, a provider of trading terminals and news to commodities and futures traders. He was president of Switchboard, the online phone directory company. He served as chairman and CEO of On2 Technologies, the video compression company that provided video compression software for Adobe’s Flash. Google bought On2 in 2009.