China to add more overseas flight routes as summer schedule starts

Airlines have added more routes for the summer-autumn flight season that started on Sunday, aiming to shore up flight volume to surpass pre-pandemic levels, official figures showed. 　

During the 217-day flight season that lasts till late October, a total　of 169 domestic and foreign airlines will offer　117,222 passenger and cargo flights each week, according to the Civil Aviation Administration of China. 　

Beijing Daxing International Airport said that it will add about 20 overseas routes as the summer schedule starts on Sunday, strengthening commercial and cultural ties between China and the rest of the world. 　

"After the new flight season started, the number of overseas routes has reached about 30," Li Ziwei, aviation business manager at Beijing Daxing International Airport, told China News Service, "At the beginning of the season, the number of international flights is 18.6 per day on average. During the peak period, the number of international flights will reach more than 30 times a day." 　

A Qatar Airways flight from Doha landed on Sunday, marking the resumption of passenger service between the capitals of Qatar and China for the first time since the pandemic.　 　

Chan Cheong Eu, Qatar Airways senior manager for North Asia sales noted that in addition to resuming flights to and from Beijing once a day, more overseas flights from Shanghai and Guangzhou are rebounding as outbound group tours gradually recover in China. "There will be 39 routes from China to Doha and other destinations around the world," Chan added. 　

More overseas routes are expected to open for summer at Beijing Daxing International Airport. Duan Lian, director of Cambodia Airways told CNS reporter: "We will resume the route from Beijing Daxing to Phnom Penh, capital of Cambodia, which is the first route between the two capitals after the epidemic. The flights are scheduled every Monday, Wednesday and Friday." 　 　

Chan Cheong Eu is confident about the recovery of outbound travel, and believes that it will become more active. "Today's flights arriving in Beijing are almost full, and the attendance rate of outbound flights is over 80%, so we are quite satisfied," he said.