This is an archived article that was published on sltrib.com in 2014, and information in the article may be outdated. It is provided only for personal research purposes and may not be reprinted.
About 9.7 million passengers flew out of Salt Lake City International Airport in 2013 — not counting people just transferring — up by 0.93 percent, according to data released Tuesday by the Federal Aviation Administration.
That means the airport ranks No. 26 in the nation for "enplanements," as an extra 89,000 people flew out of the airport compared to the previous year.
Nationally, enplanements went up 0.86 percent in 2013.
Airport spokeswoman Barbara Gann attributed the increase to more people flying due to an improved economy.
There was not a surge in flights being offered during the year in question, she said, but a better economy helped fill available seats. While Alaska Airlines began operating out of the airport in April of 2013, Gann said "that was only two flights" and would not have made a big difference.
Gann noted that increases have continued at the airport through the first half of 2014. "We see improvement every month," she said.
She also said the enplanement data does not include passenger transfers at hubs, "and that is usually about half of our passenger traffic mix" because Salt Lake City is a hub for Delta Air Lines.
The FAA also had numbers for other airports in Utah.
St. George had 54,574 enplanements, up 1.1 percent. Wendover — which mostly has flights chartered by casinos to bring in customers from a rotation of cities nationwide — had 52,162 enplanements, down 11.8 percent.
Provo had 30,090, up 1.13 percent. Ogden quadrupled to 15,523 because of new flights offered there by Allegiant Air.
Cedar City had 13,214, down 16.8 percent. Vernal had 8,203, up 11.3 percent. And Moab had 4,236, down by 46.8 percent.