Kathmandu, January 18
Himalaya Airlines, a Nepal-China joint venture, has resumed non-stop scheduled flights to Beijing on January 17.
The Kathmandu-Beijing flight was previously suspended in 2020 amidst the COVID-19 pandemic. The flights have been restarted after China eased its travel restrictions on January 8.
Himalaya Airlines is planning to reconnect with Beijing Daxing International Airport with its weekly service starting from February 11 and is scheduled to fly every Saturday.
The first resumption flight, H9 665 departed from Tribhuvan International Airport at 10:41am (local time) and touched down at Beijing Daxing International Airport (PKX) at 17:04pm (local time).
The flight duration was three hours and 48 minutes.
The return flight H9 666, from Beijing, was scheduled to depart at 18:05pm (local time) and landed in Kathmandu at 21:56pm (local time).
"With the approaching Chinese New Year holiday season, resuming non-stop direct flights between the capital cities of China and Nepal is indeed stimulating for us. Through this connection, we are hopeful towards serving more passengers from China to Nepal and vice versa for tourism as well as business. We are very happy to reestablish this connectivity and look forward to cater our passengers with increased frequency," said Vijay Shrestha, vice-president, administration of Himalaya Airlines.
Himalaya Airlines is also the first Nepal-based airline to directly connect Nepal with northern China via Lhasa through the trans-Himalayan route owing to reduced flight time by nearly two hours for a round trip.
A version of this article appears in the print on January 19, 2023, of The Himalayan Times.
