SriLankan Airlines reduces flights to China

SriLankan Airlines is rationalising services to China in accordance with current market conditions as per its long-held commercial policies, with a temporary reduction of frequencies to several cities. 

SriLankan currently operates services to three cities in China, namely Beijing, Shanghai and Canton. The number of weekly flights to Beijing is being reduced to two from four; those to Shanghai are being reduced to two from four; and those to Canton are being reduced to three from seven. The reductions are effective from today until 28 March 2020. 

“Market conditions are constantly evaluated as part of SriLankan’s commercial policies,” the airline said, adding that the move was aimed at better reflecting present passenger demand in the wake of a significant reduction in the number of Chinese travellers venturing overseas following the outbreak of the novel coronavirus epidemic.

Many airlines have already reduced frequencies to China due to a drop in demand, the reasons for which include restrictions by the Chinese Government on overseas travel of its own citizens. These include four Chinese airlines that operate between Colombo and several Chinese cities.

SriLankan is deploying the aircraft released from the China flights to increase capacity in other regions, including upgrading the Colombo-Abu Dhabi sector to a wide-body aircraft, and to advance scheduled heavy maintenance activities on several aircraft.

SriLankan’s route network spans 116 cities in 51 countries. As a member of the oneworld global airline alliance, it also connects passengers to over a 1,000 cities in more than 180 countries and territories through 13 member airlines.