Steam Packet passenger figures have dropped during this year’s TT festival compared with last year’s numbers.

Figures released by the Steam Packet Company state that 35,852 passengers were transported via the ferry service for the 2018 TT festival from May 21 to June 8.

This is 648 passengers fewer than last year, with 36,500 travelling to the island in 2017.

The number of bikes transported during this year’s TT period were also down from the previous year.

A total of 13,236 were transported this year, while 14,037 bikes were brought over to the island in 2017.

On June 11 in a previous news release, the Steam Packet announced that its ’final figures for this year’s fortnight were on a par with last year’, but did not go into further detail of this year’s total of passengers who travelled during the TT festival.

The company also stated that there was a 7% increase in visitor arrivals during the month of May with more than 11,000 passengers travelling from Heysham compared with 10,207 in the same month last year.

It also confirmed an increase in deposit bookings for TT 2019.

Chief executive Mark Woodward said: ’Comparing the first 17 days from when bookings for the 2019 TT opened last month to the same period last year there has been an 8% increase in TT deposit bookings with a 14% increase in passengers.’

’These figures are not only highly encouraging but are also evidence of the TT’s continued attraction for motorcycling race fans.’

Mr Woodward added that the demand to travel to the TT event and other motorcycling events such as the Southern 100 International Road Races in July and the Isle of Man Festival of Motorcycling in August remained ’extremely high’.