Data Analysis in the Airline Industry: Revealing the Impacts of COVID-19 on Global Air Transport (and Vice Versa)

The aviation sector is a major factor in our globalized society, funding the highest levels of advanced engineering for its own operations and providing irreplaceable services to various industries such as tourism and transportation. On the other hand, the efficiency and scale in which people are moved through air traffic plays a central role in the spread of diseases such as COVID-19. This paper analyzes the interactions between air traffic and the current COVID-19 pandemic. By combining air traffic with epidemiological data we assess (i) how COVID-19 affects the aviation industry, including factors that explain the differences in impact among countries, (ii) how the transportation of passengers contributes to the spread of the disease globally, and (iii) how air traffic restrictions are related to epidemic status in the countries. We explore these issues with a combination of exploratory analysis, modelling and complex network analysis. We believe that our models and analyses contribute for developing guidelines to minimize impacts in health and economic outcomes.