By Richard N. Velotta (contact)

Published Fri, Sep 19, 2008 (2:49 p.m.)

Updated Fri, Sep 19, 2008 (3:01 p.m.)

Passenger counts at McCarran International Airport declined by the highest percentage of the year in August — nearly 10 percent — as airline capacity cuts and the shaky economy continued to take their toll on Southern Nevada’s tourism industry.

McCarran reported 3.9 million passengers flying to and from the airport for the month, a 9.9 percent decline from August 2007. It was the steepest percentage decline since the post-9/11 era, overshadowing July’s 8.6 percent decrease from the previous year.

The August passenger totals brought the eight-month total for the year to 30.7 million passengers, 4.8 percent fewer than the first eight months of 2007.

Only one of the top five airlines serving McCarran had more passengers in August than it had a year earlier.

American Airlines, one of the few carriers increasing capacity to the Las Vegas market in August over the previous year, had 189,728 passengers, 7.5 percent more than it had a year earlier. American, the No. 5 carrier at McCarran by passenger counts, increased the number of seats it has coming into the market by 5.7 percent.

The top four carriers showed declines in August. Southwest Airlines served 1.4 million passengers (down 7.3 percent), US Airways – one of the leading capacity cutters – had counts fall to 651,124 (down 22.9 percent), United had 264,949 (down 4.8 percent) and Delta Air Lines was at 191,874 (down 15.8 percent).

Las Vegas-based Allegiant Air had 155,319 passengers for the month, off 0.8 percent for the month, but the airline is still 3 percent ahead of last year for the first eight months of 2008.

The one bright spot in McCarran’s statistics were in international passenger counts. There were 193,121 arrivals and departures internationally, 3 percent ahead of August 2007, thanks primarily to strong performances by Canada’s Westjet Airlines (up 30.4 percent) and Mexico’s Aviacsa (up 7.8 percent).

McCarran’s primary carriers to Europe and Asia also had good months with London-based Virgin Atlantic up 2 percent to 24,427 passengers and Seoul-based Korean Airlines up 4.4 percent to 5,892 passengers for the month.