Airlines to Europe fly again

By Wang Wen and Liu Yujie (China Daily)
Updated: 2010-04-22 10:28

China's largest airline, Air China, said all its flights from Beijing to Europe had returned to "normal" service on Wednesday.

Flights leaving Beijing for Europe have been grounded since April 15, after ash clouds emitted by an erupting Icelandic volcano closed the skies over the European continent.

Air China said on its website that nine flights were set to head off to Europe, with the first scheduled at noon for Frankfurt.

However, seven of the flights were facing delays of between 10 minutes and more than one hour, and two were already cancelled.

"All of our flights to Europe have returned to normal service, but it is still possible that some flights will be cancelled for other reasons," said Zhu Mei, an official with Air China.

Some other airlines said their flights to Europe would gradually return to standard service.

An Air France flight from Beijing to Paris carrying 300 people also took off at 14:36 pm on Wednesday, as a signal that the airline's flights were returning to normal, said Zhou Yinghui, a press officer with Air France in Beijing.

"We are trying to make sure passengers can fly on time, but it depends on the airport in Paris," Zhou said.

Many European passengers remained in Beijing to wait for extra flights out of the capital.

As many as 60 passengers from northern Europe were staying in the Radisson Blu Hotel in Beijing, a favorite for Europeans.

"Since April 15, our 367 rooms have been fully booked and we still receive numerous reservation calls every day," said Eric Li, a receptionist at the hotel.

He said some airlines had even organized passengers to undertake short travel trips in Beijing, while the delay persists.

John Wijngaard, from Belgium, has spent two weeks in Beijing with his wife. They decided to put off the travel excursions and wait for flight information.

"We have no idea when we can leave," he said on Wednesday.

Nicolas Redureau, 35 and from France, came to Beijing on April 3 with his Chinese girlfriend. Their flight to Paris, which was planned to take off on April 18, was cancelled and they had to change their tickets to May 6.

"Although the Air France flight took off, we still have to wait until May 6 because we changed our tickets," he said.

Redureau said he had to cancel all his business dates and travel trips.