Airports to handle 3 million holiday passengers

Ti Gong

Shanghai’s two airports are expected to handle a record number of over three million passengers during the seven-day National Day holiday.

Over 13,000 flights will take off or land at the Pudong International Airport between October 1 and 7 with around 2.16 million passengers, a 6.8 percent increase on last year. Most passengers are heading to southwest and northeast Chinese cities as well as Southeast Asia and Japan, the Shanghai Airport Authority said.

Hongqiao International Airport is expected to handle 867,500 inbound and outbound passengers during the holiday, about 3 percent more than last year, with 130,000 a day at the beginning and end of the holiday, the authority said.

A new tourist information center has opened at the arrival level of Hongqiao's T2 building, featuring foreign language services.

The center will operate from 9am to 9pm every day to offer tourist information, guides and and flight information. An robot named “Hong Bao” will be able to answer passengers' questions. 

A, foreign language volunteer team has been established at the Pudong airport, with more than 100 volunteers offering various language services including some minority languages, the airport authority said.

Ti Gong

China Eastern Airlines plans to deploy about 21,000 flights between Sunday and October 7 with over 3 million seats, a 5.5 percent increase on the year, the Shanghai-based carrier said.

Additional flights have been deployed on routes from Shanghai to popular tourism cities such as Sanya in south Hainan Island, Chengdu in southwest Sichuan Province and Guangzhou and Shenzhen in south Guangdong Province. International flights to Japan and South Korea have also been added.

Capacity has reached over 90 percent to popular destinations such as Singapore, the Maldives, Seoul, Jeju, Busan, Paris, Amsterdam and Rome, China Eastern said.