BOOSTED by an early Easter, British Airways carried an increased number of passengers last month.

A total of 2.98 million people travelled on BA scheduled services in March 2005 - 1.1% up on the March 2004 total.

The biggest increase was in the Asia-Pacific sector, where numbers rose 9.8% to 152,000.

BA's planes were 75.7% full in March 2005 - an increase of 1.7% on the March 2004 total.