By staff reporter

Aer Lingus' passenger numbers for January rose by 5.8% to 563,000 from 532,000 the same time last year.

The airline said its short-haul numbers had risen by 6.2% to 514,000 while its long-haul figures increased by 2.1% 49,000.

It added that numbers on its regional operations rose by over 26% to 53,000.

Aer Lingus said its short-haul load factor – in other words, the number of seats it fills on each flight - increased by two percentage points to 62.5%, with capacity up by 4.6%.

But its long-haul load factor fell by 3.9 points to 61.8% with capacity rising by 8%.