The number of passengers flying on long haul flights from UK airports increased by almost 50 per cent in the past ten years, the Civil Aviation Authority (CAA).
As total of 32 million passengers took long haul flights in 1996, compared to 47 million last year.
The data was released as part of the CAA's new report, Connecting the Continents: Long Haul Passenger Operations from the UK, released as a new EU-US agreement is set to start next year that will allow airlines to increase the number of long haul flights they operate.
It also marks the end of the regulations of airfares on long haul flights by the CAA on March 2008.
Airfares were liberalised last November, but the CAA had waited on doing the same to UK-US routes until related legislation had been worked out.
But with increasing number of UK passengers taking long haul flights and its importance to the business community, the CAA argued that now was the time to begin the process of deregulation.
'This report charts significant change in the long haul aviation market which is crucial to the UK's business connectivity to the fast growing economies in other continents.
'Competition is increasing and with it the choice of destinations, routes and fares to the benefit of passengers,' said Dr Harry Bush, the CAA's group director of economic regulation.
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