UPDATE 3-EasyJet dips as strike-hit April knocks profit outlook

* Says booking are recovering, expects full-year growth

* Shares down 8.5 percent (Adds CEO comments)

By Sarah Young

LONDON, May 12 (Reuters) - British airline easyJet's outlook has been knocked by a difficult April, with air traffic control strikes trimming profit and the Germanwings crash in France detterring customers from booking, sending its shares down 8.5 percent.

Europe's second-biggest budget carrier behind Ryanair said it is positioned for continued growth in its financial year to September, having turned a profit in the weaker winter season for the first time.

The focus on Tuesday, however, remained the negative news, with analysts saying they would reduce annual profit forecasts to reflect the 25 million pound ($39 million) hit from the French air traffic control strikes that led to the cancellation of more than 600 flights.

Chief Executive Carolyn McCall described April as a "one-off horrible month", saying that passengers had been deterred from booking by the uncertainty created by the threat of air traffic strikes as well as the Germanwings disaster in March, which claimed the lives of all 150 people on board.

"A lot of passengers just didn't book in April ... There is no question (that) when you see any tragic event, you just see a reaction to that from consumers," McCall said, adding that it was hard to quantify the financial impact of the crash on bookings and reassuring that the effect was short term.

"It has recovered, we've picked up momentum again," she said.

The company is now forecasting third-quarter revenue per seat to be down by about four percentage points, excluding currency effects. The drop is partly attributable to the timing of Easter and its decision to pass on lower fuel costs to consumers through lower fares.

SHARE PRICE REACTION

Numis analyst Wyn Ellis said he is cutting his forecast for easyJet's full-year pretax profit to 660 million pounds ($1.03 billion) from 691 million pounds.

Shares in easyJet fell 8.5 percent to 16.78 pounds at 0926 GMT, their lowest level for two months, though some analysts said the price reaction was overdone.

"The scale of the reaction to the outlook seems somewhat excessive," Hargreaves Lansdown analyst Richard Hunter said.

EasyJet forecast revenue and profit growth for the full year, giving no further details other than forward bookings being in line with last year and forecasting that its fuel bill would shrink by up to 120 million pounds because of lower oil prices.

Ryanair said in February that profit would rise only modestly in the year ahead as low oil prices help rivals to cut fares.

EasyJet, like other European airlines, has typically made a loss over winter months in which fewer people fly. But the company reported pretax profit of 7 million pounds for the six months to March 31. That was at the upper end of its forecast for between a loss of 5 million pounds and a profit of 10 million pounds.

It said a lower fuel price and favourable currency movements, as well as a strong finish to the ski season, helped it to achieve the first-half profit. ($1 = 0.6422 pounds) (Editing by John Stonestreet and David Goodman)