Air China and Hainan Airlines plan to expand schedules to USA

Air China and Hainan Airlines plan to expand their schedules between the USA and China after that country’s government relaxed Covid-19-driven entry requirements.

The two Chinese carriers submitted new schedules to the US Department of Transportation (DOT) in a regulatory filing on 4 January.

Air China will be offering more flights between Los Angeles and the Chinese capital beginning on 8 January, the date the Chinese government has set to lift quarantine rules and most of its travel restrictions, and expanding to daily service later in the month.

That carrier will resume direct flights between Beijing and New York’s John F Kennedy International airport from 18 January, while four-times-weekly flights to San Francisco will return on 1 March. The airline will also restart thrice-weekly flights to Washington DC’s Dulles International airport on 2 March.

Hainan Airlines is resuming flights between Boston and Seattle in the USA and Beijing, as well as flights to Shanghai and Chongqing from 17 February.

US airlines, meantime, are biding their time and currently have no plans to expand their services.