The 2024 Spring Festival travel rush lasted some 40 days and ended on March 5. China Eastern Airlines and its subsidiaries Shanghai Airlines and China United Airlines operated 106,800 passenger flights, transporting nearly 16.5 million passengers, with an average load factor exceeding 82%.
According to statistics released, the airline carried an average of more than 412,400 passengers daily during the Spring Festival travel rush. The peak period occurred from Feb. 14 to 16, during which the daily passenger volume exceeded 480,000 for those three days.
READ: Accelya and flydubai renew and enhance decade-long cargo partnership
As the most significant home-based airline in Shanghai, China Eastern Airlines facilitated over 44,000 arriving and departing flights at the Shanghai Hongqiao International Airport and Shanghai Pudong International Airport during the Spring Festival travel rush. The airline served over 6.85 million passengers, including more than 530,000 transit passengers and over 4,000 unaccompanied minors.
“Outbound travel” became one of the keywords for this year’s Spring Festival travel rush. Benefiting favourable factors such as visa-free policies, China Eastern Airlines flights to Southeast Asia and between China and Italy remained popular.
In particular, Malaysia, Singapore, and Thailand saw a large influx of passengers after applying relevant visa-free policies.
In the first two months of this year, China Eastern Airlines flights to Malaysia had an average load factor of 82.7%. Meanwhile, the passenger volume on flights between China and Italy increased by 62% yearly.
READ: Cathay Pacific: Fighting plastic waste in cargo operations
Furthermore, China Eastern Airlines’ industry-leading “full-journey online” in-flight Wi-Fi service also experienced a peak in usage during this year’s Spring Festival travel rush. Statistics show that the airlines’ in-flight Wi-Fi service was provided on 10,787 wide-body aircraft flights, used by over 540,000 passengers during the travel rush.
