Bristol Airport has achieved its busiest day ever with more than 25,000 passing through the terminal on Thursday last week.
The record for a 24-hour period is another milestone for the expanding airport and comes as work on a £8.6m extension to its 14-year-old terminal building is about to start. 
In total 25,390 people arrived at or departed from the airport last Thursday. Passenger numbers have been rising steadily this summer with monthly records set during June, with 646,000 passengers, and July, with 690,500 – up 3.34% and 2.8% respectively on the same months last year.
Annual passenger numbers reached 6.23m in the year to June, beating the previous record set in 2008.
The increases are due to a number of factors, including the introduction of a larger aircraft on KLM’s four times daily service to Amsterdam, and high load factors on other charter and scheduled flights during the peak holiday season.
A new summer service to Stockholm, operated by Scandinavian Airlines (SAS), was launched in June while tour operator Just Sunshine launched an additional Tunisia flight.
Bristol Airport aviation director Shaun Browne said: “Milestones like this demonstrate that passengers are increasingly choosing the convenience of flying from their regional airport when the flights and holidays they want become available.
“By working with airlines and tour operators to extend the choice of products and destinations they offer from Bristol we hope to further reduce the need for passengers to fly from airports outside the South West.
“Looking ahead to 2015, we are well progressed with potential new route opportunities and expect further developments in the coming weeks.”
The airport also recently opened a new £6.5m central walkway ahead of its busy summer holiday period to meet passenger and airline demand. The eastern terminal extension will be open next summer.
The scheme forms the latest stage of a large-scale, phased development at the airport which will lift capacity from 6m to 10m passengers a year. Bosses also hope it will bring about the return of direct transatlantic flights and the opening of new Middle East routes.
