Hundreds of thousands of passengers scrapped plans to jet abroad last month as the Omicron coronavirus strain gripped Britain.
At least 600,000 passengers cancelled trips on flights from Heathrow in December as tougher travel restrictions were introduced to tackle the runaway spread of the strain.
A total of 19.4 million people travelled through the airport last year - down 12.3% on 2020, when travel curbs were in place for much of the year.
Fears over the Covid variant meant that, from late November, all travellers arriving in the UK were required to take a pre-departure lateral flow test and self-isolate until they received a negative result from a post-arrival PCR test.
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Heathrow chief executive John Holland-Kaye said: "There are currently travel restrictions, such as testing, on all Heathrow routes.
“The aviation industry will only fully recover when these are all lifted and there is no risk that they will be reimposed at short notice, a situation which is likely to be years away."
The Mirror told on Saturday how bookings had soared after the Government announced testing for travellers would be eased.
Rules were relaxed for fully-vaccinated arrivals after travel firms said they were ineffective given Omicron was already spreading widely in the UK.
Double-jabbed passengers travelling to Britain now only need to take a lateral flow or PCR test up to two days after they have arrived.
Airlines UK chief Tim Alderslade said tonight: “Bookings have gone through the roof since the move away from pre-departure and PCR testing last week, which proves what we have always said about demand being there for holidays and trips abroad.
“People have just been waiting for these onerous restrictions to be removed and they have responded in droves, with bookings in some cases almost back to pre-pandemic levels.
“Ministers should be commended for moving us in the right direction, but we will never return to full health as long as we persist with even the less expensive LFDs.
"With Omicron now known to be less severe than initially feared – and transmission very much spread across the whole of the UK – we should follow the example set by other countries across Europe and scrap testing altogether for the fully-vaccinated."
