travelinmanS

They are the flights United asked CAAC to approve which they didn’t and that’s the reason the DOT stopped all flights. The only flights operating now are the ones listed under 国内航司 everything else is awaiting approval which means they shouldn’t be selling tix.

onuhistorian0116

The reward system is absurd, and leaves travelers in a state of flux. I am currently a foreign resident in China, but I’m supposed to move to Ethiopia in August. Let’s say that Ethiopian Airlines announces that they have received permission from the CAAC and they will resume ADD/PVG, but on the flight the week before I’m supposed to travel, there are 5 positive cases, all the sudden my flight is cancelled a week before I’m supposed to leave. What if I have an expiring visa?

Also because the border is closed, virtually everyone on these China-bound flights will be Chinese. They are essentially punishing airlines for bringing their own citizens home. It is pretty incredible how Chinese citizens have been hung out to dry by their own country.

This is a classic Chinese Government move. Create a completely unreasonable law and stand behind “rule of law.” This gives them an easy excuse to quickly shut down flights again.

Also, as has been pointed out elsewhere, it is a stupid policy because one flight a week to Holland or Korea is quite different than one flight a week to the U.S., Russia, or Canada.

889

"The reward system is absurd, and leaves travelers in a state of flux."

As a warning to anyone planning travel this summer, it's not only China using a reward/punishment approach. When 12 passengers on a Qatar flight to Greece tested positive a few days ago, Greece suspended all Qatar flights until June 15, upending the travel plans of anyone with a booking in the next two weeks.

https://neoskosmos.com/en/166946/ath...k-australians/

m.y

The two weeks notice period allows China to adjust their policies and approve applications from US Carriers. Trump prefers China allowing US airlines to fly to China instead of stopping flights all together.

m.y

Just because someone else does it, doesn't mean it is not absurd. The reward system downloads testing responsibilities to the airlines, who are not equipped to handle the testing, and even with the false negative rates of existing tests, that airlines may still end up carrying asymptomatic patients. With China's record of transparency, who knows is US will trust the testing results provided by China.

889

"Just because someone else does it, doesn't mean it is not absurd."

Whensoever did I imply it wasn't? The point is to warn those travelling this summer that that approach isn't limited to China and that it can upend the best of plans.

Ricebucket

Many of you are missing the point: I think China doesn't actually want international flights to resume, and are only keeping the flights for the sake of saying "we have not banned international flights." This whole policy/negotiation mess is all for optics.

There are thousands of people in quarantine hotels in Shanghai, Beijing, etc. The Five Ones policy was put in place because the logistics of processing and holding these people got too complicated and costly. I don't see how this would have changed recently.

And given the relative number of cases in China and elsewhere, there's even less reason for China to let foreign passengers in, even if they're Chinese citizens. In the case of the US specifically, there's very little goodwill in China at this point after how much Trump tried to pin all the blame on China and bragged about his travel ban. I'm not sure if there's anyone left inside China pushing for flights to resume.

Looking at the big picture: the vast majority of the population are not going to benefit from these flights even if they do resume. There are severe travel restrictions in place in both directions (although most traffic will probably flow in one direction only). Given how high the number of cases are in the US, I'm guessing they will be in place for a long time. Thus there's very little value in resuming these flights.

Domestic travel has mostly resumed inside China. So Chinese airlines are not losing much even if their one flight a week overseas got canned.

kb1992

Actually I agree with most of what you said. Clearly the general population in China does not want any US airlines flying to China.

However, you missed the point that the current dispute US DOT vs CAAC is about equal rights under 1980 and 1999 US-China Air Agreements.

If China is so scared about the virus from US, they can suspend air travel between China and US.

It's fundamentally unfair that China forces US to have few flights due to this arbitrary 5-1 policy.

STS-134

Except those airlines would only be carrying Chinese citizens at this time, which means that they don't want their own citizens to be able to go back to their own country? So be it. But just make sure all of the Chinese citizens currently in the US who want to go back to China but can't know where the blame lies for their inability to return.

m.y

It's also something for foreign governments to think about when granting student and work visas to Chinese citizens that their government can prevent them from going back.

quintic

It used to be more, NW, CO, then merge happened.

kb1992

They already know. See this CAAC official Weibo (social media) flooded with angry Chinese students and visitors in the US.

https://www.weibo.com/1821797847/J53...d1591383441186

This reward system is absurd beyond comprehension. Let's say last week UA's flight brought 11 positive COVID-19 cases. So China will ban UA flights for next 4 weeks?

This causes all kinds of issues.

(1) Why should the passengers next week be penalized for passengers testing last week?

(2) Can we even trust testing in China? What about false positives?

(3) What if US retaliates by arbitrarily suspending a flight from a Chinese carrier?

It's just a messy nightmare for both airlines and passengers. Whoever in CAAC came up with this idea is an idiot.

https://www.cnbc.com/2020/06/05/us-s...-carriers.html

US DOT plans to allow 2 Chinese carriers to fly to US (see link above). Since UA and DL fly to China, per 5-1 policy, China can only do 2

According to DOT, seven Chinese carriers (CA/HU/MU/CZ/MF/3U/JD) submitted application for flights.

Sorry, no. You can't do 7 flights because US has only 2.

Let Chinese government taste their own medicine.

anacapamalibu

Better jump on these tickets...only 2 left

kb1992

No worries. This flight has no chance of running.

If I take a guess, UA's one weekly flight will be SFO-PVG with a stop in ICN to change crew.

The 787 or 777W will stay at PVG for 3 hours then fly back to ICN.

Fares will be expensive, but not that expensive in the screen shot.

Ricebucket

It's an indication that the source country/carrier does not have the disease under control. Therefore all passengers are tainted, including the ones next week.

Your concerns are irrelevant from the Chinese perspective: If they can't trust anything then what's the point of testing at all. Unless you're going to claim that China is going to secretly sabotage only the tests from the American carriers, then I think this rule is fair.

If you have doubts about something as basic as this, you probably shouldn't have flights to China anyway. There's a lot of things you have to trust when the planes are on the ground. For example, are Chinese security checks adequate? Is the disease really under control in China?

I find the outrage on suspending flights (including if the US arbitrarily suspends a Chinese carrier) much ado about nothing in the big context of things. Let's remember that the vast majority of people who might have previously wanted to fly are now forbidden to fly because of entry restrictions in both countries, regardless of the number of flights available. Especially in the China-US direction.

I actually think it's a great idea. It's a flexible policy based on data, with both stick and carrot (e.g. you can have more flights if you ensure better safety). This makes everyone safer, including the passengers flying on those flights who might otherwise get sick from the guy next to them.

In the US-China case, with the prices of tickets going through the roof, the marginal cost for passengers and airlines to have prior testing is not high at all. If you're flying at this time, you *really* want to fly. I'm not 100% sure but I believe China is already requiring passengers to register via wechat before they depart with relevant health information.

My argument from my previous post was that China would probably be just fine if Chinese carriers are limited to 2 flights, since China at this point isn't really all that interested in a lot of international flights. Previously, US-China is served by 4 Chinese carriers. Now, it seems that the routes will be served by 2 Chinese and 2 US carriers, with potential to increase. That's probably OK.