Airlines, Reflecting China’s Reopening, Start to Rebound

RIO DE JANEIRO, BRAZIL – Airlines have increased their flight seating capacity this week, particularly companies serving China and Hong Kong, an indicator that the sector is starting to rebound from the strong impact of the coronavirus pandemic, according to OAG Aviation Worldwide.

Globally, carriers added 600,000 net seats for a total of nearly 30 million, an increase of about two percent over the previous week, OAG senior analyst John Grant wrote in a report. The figure is a long way from the weekly capacity of about 110 million seats for this season last year, but is still encouraging.

Northeast Asia is a positive highlight. China, the first country affected by the virus, has added one million seats to this week’s scheduled flights, 800,000 of them on domestic routes. Now that the economy has reopened, the Asian country is operating twice as many seats as the US. In Hong Kong, Cathay Pacific Airways added 40,000 seats and increased frequency by about 120 flights, Grant said.

“China’s domestic capacity is now at 75 percent of January’s level; in the United States it is 27 percent; and in Russia it is 49 percent of pre-Covid-19 levels,” he said. “For anyone interested, the UK level is now about four percent.”

Some markets are still on a downward trend due to travel restrictions to contain the virus, which has infected more than four million people and killed almost 290,000.

South Asian airline seating capacity has dropped 14 percent this week, and is 72 percent lower than in January, but it could rebound as India considers resuming flights after national confinement, Grant said.

Source: Bloomberg