Cebu Air Inc., the operator of Cebu Pacific and Cebgo on Monday said net loss grew by 516.9 percent in the first quarter of 2021 due to the impact of COVID-19 outbreak.

The Gokongwei-led airline said net loss amounted to P7.29 billion in the January to March period, up from P1.18 billion in the same period last year. 

The company’s revenues fell by 83 percent to P2.71 billion in the first quarter from P15.91 billion last year. 

“The overall decline in revenues was brought about by the impact of the COVID-19 outbreak which started with cancellation of flights to China, Hong Kong, Macau and South Korea in varying periods in early 2020 due to the imposition of travel restrictions,” CEB said.

“With the rapid escalation of the situation surrounding COVID-19, the Philippine government implemented a community quarantine which then prompted the Group to suspend all its scheduled flights beginning March 19, 2020,” it added. 

Passenger revenues went down by92.2 percent to P887.4 billion from P11.38 billion earned last year. 

This was mainly attributable to the 87.5 percent  decrease in passenger volume from 4.4 million to 0.5 million brought about by lesser number of flights by 75.8 percent together with a 28.2 percentage points decline in seat load factor from 81.3 percent to 53.2 percent. 

The company incurred operating expenses of P9.493 billion lower by 42.8 percent compared to the P16.607 billion operating expenses recorded last year. 

This was mostly driven by the suspension of the Group’s operations due to the COVID-19 global pandemic since a material portion of its expenses are based on flights and flight hours.