neofung

IIRC, KA168 departed 9pm from HKG. Before COVID, given the frequent flow control in China, KA aircrafts were always hold at China or HKG (for flight to China). Therefore most departures in the evening were subject to frequent delay. They may also wait for late inbound aircraft for transit passengers.

The HK-India air service agreement limits only two HK carriers can serve HKG-India market, may be CX group will use UO brand to serve India market to prevent potential competitor to enter the market.

JW95

Is there any chance at all that some of the aforementioned (IAD, BRU, LGW et al.) routes will resume in the medium/long term? I appreciate that the situation RE. Covid and travel restrictions remains very volatile at present, with HKG remaining closed to tourism. However, looking forwards, no doubt Cathay are keen to get more of their network back online (just as much as other airlines are!). Which routes stand the strongest chance of coming back? Personally, I would love to see LGW back- I loved using this route since its launch in 2016, especially since it was more convenient than having to use LHR prior to Cathay's return to LGW. Plus, I always found the experience of travelling through the South Terminal much more relaxed than LHR. London has historically been a key market for CX (whether it will in the long run remains to be seen), however, hopefully once HKG reopens, demand will begin picking back up again. I am sure that Cathay's priority will be to reinstate the 5 daily 77Ws at LHR first before sending the 359s back to LGW. I remember speaking to the CX team in LGW as well as to someone in their London office, and they mentioned that Gatwick had grown to become a good route for the airline that had been working very well alongside the LHR operation. I hope that they will come back.

garykung

No. Route termination is not always about cutting losses, but also cutting costs.

There is simply no point running separate routes for the same metropolitan area.

brunos

Longhaul travel will not resume to pre-covid levels for many years, maybe decades, to come.
There is no chance to see those destinations return before that.

JW95

A bit of a long shot, but seeing as quite a bit has changed since this thread was last active, what routes (if any) do people think CX would consider reinstating going into 2023 and beyond, now that HKG restrictions have begun easing and transit flying resuming? There has been a lot of talk recently about network rebuilding at CX, as well as mass rehiring in anticipation of the continued recovery of air travel, so would be interested to know what your thoughts are.

Sources:

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/artic...-travel-bounce
https://simpleflying.com/cathay-paci...rictions-ease/
https://www.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/...part-ambitious

percysmith

So far speculation and fake news - there is no confirmed relaxation of flight suspension mechanism, there is no confirmed relaxation of quarantine.

Any statement by anyone - even HK government officials - is merely hearsay and rumour.

So long as Covid Zero remains current national policy everything else is unbased rumour.

JW95

All valid points, however, CX has managed to increase its flying programme significantly over the same period last year (although barely scratches the surface on S19 schedules), so there has evidently been some degree of relaxation to the zero-Covid approach and quarantining, especially with transit flying now resuming. I hope this continues to head in the right direction, as it'll be good to see more of CX's network come back online

percysmith

Schedules aren’t set in stone. No financial penalty for CX accepting a booking then cancellation outside 14 days (EU/UK/CA).

drivingflyingwalking

My thoughts are that the regional Asia market especially China will be the first ports to be brought back, followed by major ports in Australia, USA and Europe.

In Australia I don't see Adelaide coming back, in Europe I doubt Madrid, Barcelona or one of the Italian ports will return. In North America we will always have SFO, LAX, JFK, YVR, YYZ. If ORD or BOS make long term returns who knows?

heard rumours of Johannesburg coming back soon!

pWei

After midnight departures are great - get a full day in on the way out, and land in the early AM, which is good for connecting as well. Would love to see it come back.

However - the covid policy would have to change significantly, at least for transit pax, to remove all irrops risk.

JW95

I sincerely hope that there won't be further cutbacks as far as CX's European presence is concerned, as we've already seen cutbacks and long term suspensions here I think if they were to cut back on Italy, I'd guess that FCO would go, as this has been lower yielding compared to MXP? For example, in 'normal' times, MXP has seen daily 4-class 777Ws for years, whereas FCO seasonally alternates between 3-weekly and daily A359s without F. With rehiring (supposedly) commencing soon, hopefully this marks the end of route cutbacks, as it would be nice to see the network rebuilt.

fakecd

cathay pathetic doesnt even have enough crew for skeleton roaster. they are complete joke, and they wont recover. how about get a frigging daily flight to main destination without cancelling? thats a good start. but next J travel is on SQ... how can CX really compete with their once a month flight o BNE when SQ has 3 daily flights?

Cambo

Let me describe a realcd for you: It's not CX being pathetic, it's the whole of Zero Covid in China, which has created this whole mess, not to say, the whole China society is at a near breakdown now, so things can become pretty challenging.

Where CX's size is pretty small at the moment, they do have A) a reputation, B) procedures, working principles and contracts in place and C) Landing rights all over the world. So, once China does swallow its Zero Covid pride, things can go up pretty steep for CX.

nomadabroad

Well in my opinion it is pathetic if they can’t even figure out how many / which flights they want to operate to some core destinations including LHR this fall/winter…flights being canceled, moved around frequently etc which will deter people from booking with CX at the end of the day….

Cambo

Do you really think, it is CX causing these issues, when they do have to deal with an unreliable government like HK/China ? It's difficult planning around such a behavior. Chicken-Egg, nobody wants to do business with you, when your government is changing policies overnight at an Authoritarian pen stroke.

Oh, and this "happened" today:

China's Zero Covid target to last for another 5 years

Of course, censorship jumped in, though, now we know the planning. So, be prepared.

CX, take care you expand your Hub to other Asian cities, using local subsidiaries, there is no survival in Hong Kong !