Dublin, May 5 (IANS): Monthly traffic figures of Europe's largest budget airline Ryanair have returned to pre-pandemic levels for the second month in a row, according to the statistics released by the Ireland-headquartered carrier.

In April 2022, Ryanair operated over 82,600 flights, carrying a total of 14.24 million passengers, up nearly 5.5 per cent when compared with the 13.5 million passengers it carried in April 2019, Xinhua news agency reported citing the company as saying.

This is the second month in a row that Ryanair's monthly traffic numbers have surpassed the pre-pandemic levels.

In March 2022, Ryanair handled 11.2 million passengers, up 2.75 per cent when compared with the 10.9 million passengers it handled in March 2019.

The year 2019 was the best for Ryanair in terms of the number of passengers it handled.

In the calendar year, the airline handled over 152 million passengers, the highest in its history.

As nearly all the Covid-19-related flight restrictions have been dropped in most European countries and the busy summer season for tourism is approaching, industry watchers believe that Ryanair's monthly traffic figures will continue to improve in the coming months.