Bangladesh closes airspace in new COVID-19 lockdown

All passenger flights to, from, and within Bangladesh remain suspended until April 20, 2021, as the country entered another strict COVID-19 lockdown on April 14, 2021. The Civil Aviation Authority of Bangladesh (CAAB) announced all international passenger flights, as well as all sorts of domestic flights, were grounded with effect from 0001L (1801Z) on April 14 until 2359L (0559Z) on April, 20 April. Only cargo, medevac, humanitarian/relief, and flights cleared under special consideration would be allowed to operate. Standard disinfection, sanitisation, and social distancing procedures for passengers, crew, equipment, and aircraft (inflight or on the ground) were mandatory for flights permitted to operate. The regulations affect Bangladesh’s scheduled carriers, Biman Bangladesh Airlines (BG, Dhaka), NovoAir (VQ, Dhaka), and US-Bangla Airlines (BS, Dhaka). National carrier Biman Bangladesh carried the CAAB notices on its website, while US Bangla Airlines on Facebook announced it was temporarily halting services in line with the government-announced lockdown. Dormant Regent Airways (RX, Dhaka) made no announcement. Apart from their domestic services, Biman and US Bangla, between them, would have to cancel 16 international flights, including to Abu Dhabi Int’l, Dubai Int’l, Jeddah, Muscat, Dammam, Delhi Int’l, Doha Hamad Int’l, Guangzhou, Hong Kong Int’l, Kathmandu, Kolkata Int’l, Kuala Lumpur Int’l, London Heathrow, Riyadh, Singapore Changi, and Chennai, according to the ch-aviation schedules module. Domestic carrier Novo Air announced via Twitter that its flights had been suspended until April 22 and requested passengers to reschedule their journeys. Affected domestic routes from Dhaka included Barisal, Rajshahi, Saidpur, Chittagong, Sylhet, Cox’s Bazar, and Jessore, according to the ch-aviation schedules data. Amongst the international airlines affected are Etihad Airways, Qatar Air Cargo, Emirates, flydubai, Gulf Air, Saudia, Kuwait Airways, Jazeera Airways, Turkish Airlines, Air India, IndiGo Airlines, Vistara, SriLankan Airlines, Malindo Air, and Himalaya Airlines.