More than six million passengers flew through MAG’s airports in August, as the summer season continued to surpass expectations.

At Manchester, 2,934,393 passengers travelled through the airport last month, an increase of nine per cent on August 2015.

That means that Manchester’s 12 month rolling total now stands at 24,605,575 passengers.

At London Stansted, 2,494,732 passengers in August meant the airport grew its passenger numbers 11.8 per cent year on year and experienced its busiest single month since 2007.

More than 93 per cent of seats on Stansted flights were occupied during the month.

East Midlands Airport grew by 6.2 per cent as it welcomed 596,000 passengers, with Croatia, Ireland and the Canary Islands performing particularly well.

The continued trend across MAG’s airports this summer has been the resurgence of traditional European sun destinations, and the growth of Eastern Mediterranean and Balkan sun spots.

Across June, July and August 2016, the busiest summer holiday months, 435,600 more passengers than last year flew to and from Spain via MAG’s airports – a 12.4 per cent increase.

Canary Islands traffic jumped 21.1 per cent to more than 930,000.

Over 100,000 more passengers flew to Greece.

More niche destinations which have grown in popularity this year include Croatia, Bulgaria and Slovenia.

Ken O’Toole, chief executive of Manchester Airport, said: “August is always the busiest month of the year for the airport, as families get away during the school holidays and it was no different this year. 

“Spain has certainly proved popular, which reflected the increase in capacity we saw from airlines to the likes of the Balearics and the Costas. 

“New long haul services that have launched this summer to destinations like Boston, Los Angeles and Beijing have all contributed to a record summer for Manchester Airport.

“With new routes being recently announced to Houston, Tobago and Phuket and Mauritius, passengers will soon benefit from an even greater range of long haul destinations directly from Manchester.”