Continental's Unit Revenues Drop 15-16 Percent In October

Continental Airlines said Monday its traffic increased 1.9 percent in October, on a 2.4 percent decline in capacity. With higher traffic and less capacity, Continental filled a higher percent of seats, up 3.5 points to 83.0 percent. But the bad news is that unit revenues remained sharply down in October. The revenues per available seat mile were estimated to be 15 to 16 percent lower than in October 2008. Including regional partners, the decline was 14 to 16 percent, Continental estimated.