UK airline company, British Airways saw its competitor EasyJet Plc go past it in getting number of passengers for short-haul air travel market. The company reported a rise of 7.9 per cent in the number of passengers to be at 49.7 million over last year.

EasyJet was able to get 2.9 times as many passengers as British Airways. The European airline saw a decrease of 5.7 per cent to be at 18.4 million during 2010 as against a surge of 2.4 per cent in the previous year.

Post the news, share price of the company touched a three-month high with a surge of 4.2 per cent.

Experts say that the reason behind this is that British Airways has reduced its focus on the short-haul travel category as it has seen more profit in the inter-continental routes. Low cost rivals like Ryanair Holdings of Ireland and EasyJet have made it difficult for British Airways to come up and show higher profitability.

Ryanair Holdings alone has been able to get around 11 per cent hike in its number of passengers to be at 72.7 million. But what is surprising is that British Airways has not even tried to defend its position.