INDUSTRY
Road to Recovery
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China’s aviation industry was the first to navigate the pandemic. Its journey offers hope, even if only from within its own borders. BY WILL HORTON
Air travel in China, where COVID-19 was first detected, is seeing brighter days. Ahead of the country’s Labour Day holiday in early May, China Eastern Airlines announced plans to resume 70 to 80 percent of flights by the end of June, making it – albeit perhaps only for a fleeting time – the world’s largest carrier by seats. In the first week of May, air traffic across the country had rebounded to over 8,000 flights daily, representing a four-month high and about 65 percent of what it had been mid-January, according to data from Airsavvi.
Until the holiday, China’s lifting of restrictions had been gradual and uneven. Trunk routes by domestic carriers showed recovery in mid-April, with Shanghai–Shenzhen, for example, up to 60 daily flights, compared to 100 preCOVID-19, and Guangzhou–Hangzhou at 45, compared to 60 before. However, flights to and from Beijing remained an exception, with the key Beijing–Shanghai route only having 20 flights from a previous 110. There were even fewer to Beijing from other major cities like Chengdu and Shenzhen.
The reason? Beijing in April still required a 14-day quarantine for domestic arrivals. “It’s definitely more conservative,” according to China Aviation Valuation Advisors chairman David Yu, also an adjunct professor at New York University’s Shanghai campus. Restrictions, like having travelers selfisolate upon arrival, may help people feel
In the first week of May, domestic flights in Mainland China had rebounded to over 8,000 daily, representing a four-month high. Source: Airsavvi
Domestic Flights in Mainland China* January–May 2020
*Excludes code-sharing and stopover flights.
14,000
12,000
10,000
8,000
6,000
4,000
2,000
24
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