European travel company, TUI Group, announced its full-year financial results would likely “increase substantially” thanks to strong summer demand and an increase in winter bookings.

TUI revealed that summer bookings for 2023 were at 13.7 million, an increase of five percent year-over-year and 96 percent of pre-pandemic totals. The travel company’s data also showed that forward bookings were up 15 percent.

The travel company’s data confirms that the post-pandemic travel boom is still going strong.

“Had it not been for the various events during the last few months which were outside of our control, not least the wildfires on Rhodes, we would have performed ahead of expectations,” TUI CEO Sebastian Ebel said.

Travel in Europe this summer thrived despite extreme weather that resulted in unprecedented levels of disruption, with Eurocontrol reporting that weather-related air travel delays and cancellations were 2.5 times higher than last year.

TUI officials said that despite the travel disruption, the company told Reuters.com it would “reconfirm its underlying earnings before interest and tax would increase substantially for the fourth quarter and the year, with continued growth set for 2025 and 2026.”