Guangzhou’s Baiyun International Airport clocked its busiest day on record on Saturday as post-holiday return traffic pushed passenger volumes to unprecedented levels during the Lunar New Year travel rush, China Daily reports.
A total of 277,600 passenger trips were handled on 21 February, alongside 1,676 take-offs and landings, according to the airport authority.
Compared with the same day last year, passenger traffic rose 7.37 percent, while flight movements increased by 9.12 percent.
[See more: Macao sees 1.2 million visitors in the first week of the Lunar New Year holiday]
Cargo and mail volumes also climbed on Saturday. More than 4,150 metric tons were processed, representing a year-on-year increase of just over 9 percent.
The first 20 days of the Spring Festival travel season, which kicked off 2 February, saw Baiyun handle about 5.28 million passenger trips. That made it the first airport in China to surpass the five-million threshold during this year’s holiday rush.
The period saw consistently high passenger volumes at Baiyun, with more than 260,000 trips recorded across 11 consecutive days – from 5 to 15 February.
