The latest tracking data from Cirium, a travel data and analytics company, shows a positive uptick in tracked passenger jet activity for western Europe-based operators.

The charge has been led by France, Italy and Germany where travel restrictions are being progressively relaxed.

However, on June 15th, scheduled flights operated for these three countries were still down 85-87 per cent compared with the equivalent day a year earlier.

Meanwhile, UK and Ireland-based operators continued to lag behind their mainland European peers, with demand suppressed by quarantine measures which require arriving passengers to self-isolate for 14 days.

Tracked flights for the UK and Ireland were down 97 per cent on the same day last year.

However, comparing flights flown on June 15th with June 8th, UK operators saw the biggest week-on-week rise (67 per cent) in tracked passenger jet flights - albeit from an exceptionally low base.

Cirium has also classified an additional 165 commercial passenger jets as ‘in service’ in the last 24 hours.

This takes the total number of passenger aircraft in storage down to 12,552 (48 per cent of the global fleet) and increases the number of in-service jets to 13,636 (52 per cent of the global fleet) as of June 17th.