Decline in demands leads to cancellation of United Airlines China flights

Published on : Wednesday, January 29, 2020

China is battling with the growing number of coronavirus cases and United Airlines announced on Tuesday that it was cancelling dozens of China flights next month.

According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention on Tuesday travellers should avoid all nonessential travel to China and the Trump administration announced its plans of expanding screening for virus from 5 to 20 U.S. airports.

Among the U.S. airlines, United has the most service to China. From February 1 till Februray 8 the flight cancellations will remain effective.

On Tuesday, United also expanded its travel waiver to include Hong Kong.

United said in a statement that they will continue to monitor the situation as it develops and will adjust their scheduled as required.

From the U.S. to mainland China and Hong Kong, the airline operates about 12 flights a day.

The changes will cut down the numbers by three or four per day.

Services to Hong Kong from San Francisco and Newark, New Jersey, to Beijing from Washington Dulles, Newark and Chicago, Shanghai service from San Francisco, Newark and Chicago will be reduced.

In order to match the capacity with expected demand Air Canada will also be cancelling some China flights. The resulting capacity reduction was relatively small as the carrier had 33 flights to China in a week.

Those customers who are affected by the cancellations can change their travel plans with the airline.