Record 14.5 million passengers took off with Ryanair last year

FREE flights and cheap seats all helped Ryanair fly a record 14.5 million people around Europe in 2002.

The figure represents a 54% increase on the 9.4m passengers carried by the no-frills airline in 2001.

Last year's total was boosted by a large growth in passenger numbers during December when more than 1.3m people flew with the airline -a 64% increase on December 2001 when just under 800,000 people travelled with Ryanair.