AIRLINES ALL OVER THE WORLD ARE SUSPENDING FLIGHTS TO CHINA
The coronavirus outbreak is continuing to spread across the globe. While organizations try to figure out how to best counter the virus, airlines are increasingly suspending flights to China.
30/01/2020 .-The 2019-nCoV strain traces its roots back to Wuhan, China. This city and surrounding areas are reporting the most cases of the infection. According to CBS News, 132 people have died due to the outbreak. Additionally, there are over 5,900 confirmed cases of infection in China alone.
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Since air travel is one of the quickest ways that a virus can spread across continents, several carriers have canceled some or all of their flights to China. Here is a look at which airlines have canceled at least parts of their services to the country.
Air Canada
Business Insider reports that the flag carrier of Canada scaled back the amount of its China-bound services. Additionally, it is offering those who have flights booked to the country a chance to amend or cancel.
Air India
The carrier owned the by the government of India, China’s neighbor, is reducing its amount of flights to Hong Kong.
Meanwhile, the crew on these flights will be required to wear protective masks and return home straight away. Additionally, flights to Shanghai have been halted altogether until the middle of February.
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Air Seoul
The South Korean outfit operates three weekly flights Zhangjiajie and two weekly flights to Linyi, both of which have been suspended.
Air Tanzania
Air Tanzania was planning to launch its inaugural flight to China from its country’s capital of Dar es Salaam. However, this 787 Dreamliner flight has now been pushed back indefinitely.
American Airlines
The carrier flies to Shanghai and Beijing from the US west coast. However, these flights have now been suspended. Nonetheless, flights to these cities from the airline’s home in Dallas are continuing as normal.
Asiana Airlines
The Korean outfit is halting services to Guilin, Changsha, and Haikou from as early as this weekend.
Austrian Airlines
The Vienna-based firm serves Beijing and Shanghai but it will be stopping these services till the end of next month. It only confirmed these cuts today.
British Airways
The airline just confirmed that it has suspended all flights to mainland China until the end of the week. It had also started to offer opportunities for changes and refunds to the region since the beginning of the week.
Cathay Pacific
The flag carrier of Hong Kong is the airline in closest proximity to the most sensitive region in regards to the outbreak.
Therefore, it has decided to cut its services by half. Meanwhile, flights to Wuhan conducted by Cathay Dragon, its sister company have been completely stopped.
China Southern
The Guangzhou-based airline estimates it will be flying to Wuhan again in just over a month. According to its schedule, the Wuhan flights start again on 1st March with two daily flights to Bangkok and three daily flights to Dubai.
Delta Air Lines
The US carrier, which has a 5 percent stake in China Eastern, is reported by the South China Morning Post to be halving flights between the US and China from 42 to 21. This will be in effect between February 6 and April 30.
El Al
Haaretz reports that, as of today, El Al is suspending its flights to Beijing from Tel Aviv. The airline expects to resume on March 25th, but will be waiting to see if the situation improves by then before this is confirmed. Its flight scheduled for today is unaffected.
Eva Air
Action News Jax reports that the Taiwanese airline has placed partial cancellations of flights to and from mainland China for two weeks from February 2nd. In addition, the carrier also has stopped providing certain amenities on its flights to help reduce the risk of spreading infections.
Finnair
Finnair prides itself as a link between Europe and Asia. However, it has now been forced to cut the number of flights it serves to Beijing and stop operations to Nanjing. Although there is currently no change to flights to Guangzhou and Shanghai.
Hong Kong Airlines
HKA is cutting the number of flights to the mainland by about half through to the end of March in response to government virus-control efforts.
Iberia
The national carrier of Spain is suspending its three weekly return services between Madrid and Shanghai.
WTMJ reports that the suspension will start tomorrow and continue through February. However, this move could be extended depending on how the situation develops.
IndiGo
The popular Indian carrier is suspending services to Chengdu and Hong Kong. However, its operation to Guangzhou from Kolkata remains unaffected.
Japan Airlines
At the time of writing, JAL flights are operating as normal.
JetStar Asia
Singaporean company JetStar is canceling it’s flights to Hefei, Guiyang, and Xuzhou. These suspensions will last from January 30 until the end of March.
Kazakhstan’s airlines
Sharing a long border with far western China, Kazakhstan has announced yesterday that it plans to suspend all flights, train and bus traffic across the border. It will also halt issuing visas to Chinese nationals. Before the suspension, there were 24 flights a week from Kazakhstan to China, including a daily flight to Ürümqi, the capital of Xinjiang.
KLM
KLM is cutting its number of flights to Chinese destinations due to a drop in bookings. From Thursday, services to Chengdu and Hangzhou have been suspended.
Meanwhile flights to Xiamen will be temporarily stopped from Friday. Furthermore, flights to Shanghai have been cut to seven per week…
