Air France Braces For Fallout From Paris Attacks

Air France has experienced some reduction in traffic following last Friday's Paris attacks, but it is too early to say how severe the impact on bookings will be.

"Clearly this type of absolutely tragic event has consequences, (but) it is too early to say what the impact is," an Air France insider said, adding, "We will have to adapt."

Cancellations of bookings have exceeded new reservations, Air France-KLM chief executive Alexandre de Juniac later told CNBC.

The comments are the first sign of concern at France's national airline, which earlier this week said it had seen no immediate impact on loads over the weekend and that it was maintaining its schedules.

The airline is due to publish November traffic data on December 8.

Last week's attacks, which killed at least 129 people, sent shudders through the tourism industry as Paris is one of the world's most visited cities.

By Thursday, restaurants in the main commercial district of the city that had emptied or closed following the attacks were full of lunchtime diners and visitors said the rail and air routes into Paris looked reasonably busy.

Some other airlines acknowledged a drop in traffic as they allowed passengers to cancel tickets, but they were reluctant to speculate on how severely the attacks would damage an industry which has a record of absorbing short-term shocks from attacks or disease.

Air Berlin said it had seen a definite drop in bookings linked to Friday's events.

A Norwegian Air spokeswoman said: "We don't have an exact figure but there was only a marginal increase in cancellations to Paris at the weekend." Traffic had returned to normal this week, she said.

Scandinavia's SAS said it had not been affected.

Europe's largest budget airline, Ryanair, said bookings, including to France, remained ahead of last year.

In Asia, some tour operators cancelled package trips and predicted a further slowdown in bookings, but in Paris, groups of Chinese tourists were still visible.

Flight search websites and online travel agents declined to provide data.