Journal of Airline Operations and Aviation Management

The objective of this research is to analyse the sustainability of airlines’ operations in Andalusian airports and tourist destinations. The management of commercial airlines and how they act in uncertain times is of great importance to improving their resilience and sustainability in the aviation and tourism industries. To determine the number of operations by airlines on Andalusian airports and their positioning at these five airports from 2004 to 2022, we collected airport and airline data from AENA’s official website. Findings revealed that Andalusian airports are highly dependent on LCCs’ operations. Indeed, LCCs provide more operations than legacy carriers in Andalusian airports. Moreover, we compared the five Andalusian airport data from the pandemic crisis in 2020 with the financial crisis in 2008. The pandemic crisis was worse than the financial crisis in passenger (–60%), operations (–47.2%), and air cargo terms (–3.6%). For this reason, this research has great scientific value for researchers, airlines, airport operators, DMOs, and stakeholders because it helps us better understand the importance of airlines’ operations at airports and tourist destinations.