Here's my reasoning:
Northwest's traffic fell 1.7 percent last month to 6.27 billion revenue passenger miles from 6.38 billion a year earlier. Its results were weighed down by a 6.1 percent drop in domestic traffic, partially offset by a 1 percent increase in overseas traffic.
Northwest posted similar trends over the full fourth-quarter. During that period, its traffic dropped 0.7 percent to 18.87 billion revenue passenger miles from 19 billion. It trimmed capacity 1.5 percent to 22.88 billion available seat miles from 23.24 billion. Occupancy rose to 82.5 percent from 81.8 percent.
As opposed to
ATLANTA (AP) -- Delta Air Lines Inc. said Friday its traffic rose 3 percent in December, with much of the growth coming from increased routes abroad.
December traffic rose to 9.72 billion revenue passenger miles, up from 9.44 billion during the same period of 2006. A revenue passenger mile is a measurement of airline performance that represents one paying passenger flown one mile.
The increase came amid as capacity increased 3.1 percent. Delta flew 12.5 billion available seat miles in December, compared with 12.12 billion during the same month a year earlier.
"In December, consolidated unit revenues showed solid year over year improvement," Glen Hauenstein, executive vice president for network planning and revenue management, said in a statement.
For the full year, Delta said total traffic rose 5.1 percent to 122.06 billion revenue passenger miles, from 116.13 billion a year earlier. Capacity increased 2.5 percent to 151.76 billion in 2007, from 147.99 billion the year before, while occupancy rose 1.9 percentage points to 80.4 percent.