early one million more passengers passed through Stansted Airport during the first three months of 2015 compared with the same period a year ago, new figures revealed today.

And the increase in numbers, combined with a multi-million pound reconfiguration of the main terminal, is also delivering boost to employment at the airport.

Stansted handled a total of more than 1.67m passengers last month, an increase of nearly a quarter (24.4%) on March 2014.

This took the rolling annual total to 20.92m, an increase of nearly one sixth (16.3%) compared with the previous 12 months, making Stansted’s the UK’s fastest growing airport.

The figure also means that Stansted has now recorded 10 consecutive months of double-digit growth, with the increase in numbers reflecting the introduction new routes and increased frequencies by its airline customers.

Andrew Harrison, managing director at Stansted, said: “The first three months of 2015 have been an extremely busy and exciting time for Stansted as the airport welcomed nearly one million more passengers during the period than in 2014.

“The total number of passengers using the airport in the last 12 months grew by over 16% to leave us tantalisingly close to the 21m passengers a year milestone.

“In March, passenger numbers were up by more than 24% over the same month last year.

“This excellent performance has seen Stansted experience double digit growth for 10 consecutive months, a fantastic achievement and testament to the strength of our airline partners who have added more routes, increased frequencies to key destinations and seen more people on each flight.

“Growth in domestic traffic has been particularly strong with passenger numbers up 40% over last year due to new Scottish flights from Ryanair plus the arrival of Flybe to serve Newcastle and Isle of Man with a Newquay service joining later this year.”

Mr Harrison added: “To help keep pace with this rapid growth in passenger numbers, we continue with our investment programme to enhance and improve airport services and facilities, and we are also recruiting significant numbers of additional key staff to ensure we can get our passengers as quickly, efficiently and safely through the airport as possible.”