Examination of Airlines and Airports in COVID-19 Pandemic: A Comparative Study of Turkey with European and Global Aviation

COVID-19 pandemic caused a serious interruption in global aviation and tourism industries.The purpose of this study is to examine the economic and operational effects of COVID-19 on aviation industry including airlines and airports, and how it relates to tourism sector.A descriptive approach is adopted using secondary data and reports of national, regional, international authorities and organizations.The comparison of 2019, 2020, and in some cases, 2021, is made by analyzing and interpreting global, European, and Turkish civil aviation data together with Turkish tourism data.The findings reveal that, in contrast to cargo traffic, passenger and aircraft traffics in world, Europe, and Turkey have massively been hurt by the pandemic in 2020 which caused critical losses in airlines and airports.Since aviation is the locomotive of tourism, it is found that foreign visitors entering Turkey by air dropped significantly affecting tourism revenues in 2020.It is found that there was some recovery in aviation and tourism industries in 2021, but not as much as to the 2019 levels due to the travel restrictions and lockdowns caused by severe third and fourth waves of COVID-19 in Turkey and deferred country-wide crisis response.Lastly, several response and recovery strategies were presented, and recommendations were made that can be followed by decision-makers in aviation and tourism industries to overcome this crisis.