Planes are flying again on a handful of international routes, creating a possible path to recovery for a battered industry. But with Covid-19 still spreading, aspiring passengers will have to navigate a patchy network that might include virus tests and weeks-long quarantine. This month, China and South Korea opened a tightly controlled travel corridor between Seoul and 10 Chinese regions, including Shanghai. Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania lifted travel restrictions between the three Baltic states on May 15. Australia and New Zealand are also working to resume flights between the two countries. The unique accords have emerged as templates for airlines that have been pushed to the brink by the industry’s worst-ever crisis and for countries desperate to salvage some tourism as the world enters a deep recession. But they also highlight the biggest challenge to re-establishing international travel: there’s little agreement on what kind of protections could limit the risk of spreading Covid-19 across borders. Lifting quarantine requirements and reopening borders is fraught with risk. Returning passengers from hotspots like Iran, New York and Italy have already sparked fresh rounds of infection in countries that had seemingly flattened the curve, including China and Australia. The fact that people with no obvious symptoms can still be contagious only complicates matters, and given how easily the virus spreads and the difficulties of social distancing during travel, each reopened route could spark new waves of infections. Airlines and airports worldwide are clamoring for a coordinated approach; A United Nations agency that sets the rules for the industry, the ICAO, plans to deliver global guidelines by the end of May. <br/>
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In Thailand, you cannot have food or water in flight and must wear a mask. In Malaysia and Indonesia, the plane needs to be half-empty. In the US and Europe, it's not mandatory for airlines to leave the middle seat open. Measures to stem the spread of coronavirus have changed how people travel, as Beijing resident Feng Xueli, 26, found when she took a domestic flight this month. The aircraft was full - allowed under the Chinese rules. "We needed to wear a mask during the flight and there were PA announcements basically asking for our cooperation with these anti-virus measures put in place, which made me a bit nervous," Feng said. "You also need to go through a lot of temperature checks and security checks when you leave the airport." Travellers, airlines and airports are grappling with a hodgepodge of rules put in place during the pandemic that will make flying different in almost every country. "When flying restarts, you are already working against the clock. There is still a latent fear of travel," said Subhas Menon, head of the Association of Asia Pacific Airlines. "It's not going to be such a smooth passage when you travel because of all of the measures that are going to be introduced."<br/>
A week ago Friday, 10 Delta jetliners flew into a remote desert airstrip between Phoenix and Tucson, Arizona. Not one flew out. So far this past week, planes owned by Avianca Ecuador, Air Canada and its regional carrier Jazz Aviation, and a contract carrier from Bangor, Maine, have arrived at Pinal Air Park near Marana. They carried no passengers and only a skeleton crew, usually just a pilot and a first officer, and those planes, too, never left. In the last 10 days more than 50 jetliners have filed final flight plans to the converted World War II training base. They are part of a wave of ghost flights landing at an unprecedented rate at desert airstrips all over the Southwest near places like Marana and Kingman in Arizona, Mojave and Victorville in California, Roswell, New Mexico, and Abilene, Texas. The planes will sit in storage at the airstrips as airlines deal with the economic shocks of the COVID-19 crisis. Since Feb. 20, airline passenger traffic is down an estimated 95%, and industry stocks have lost two-thirds of their value. Rather than flying empty planes, most airlines are parking significant portions of their fleets, which even for a short term involves an intricate maintenance schedule to make sure the planes are airworthy if and when they are needed again.<br/>
European airlines are planning for a return to the skies this summer after being grounded almost completely for weeks over the coronavirus pandemic. The outlook, however, remains uncertain, with companies forecasting a slow recovery even next year due to public health restrictions and concerns. Finland's national airline, a major carrier between Europe and China, said Monday it will add more flights and routes beginning in July if governments ease their lockdowns enough for travel to resume. “We expect aviation to recover gradually, starting in July”, Finnair Chief Commercial Officer Ole Orver said. "Our intention is to operate approximately 30% of our normal amount of flights in July, and we will also start long-haul flights to our key Asian destinations. We will then add routes and frequencies month by month as demand recovers.” Other airlines are likewise preparing to fly more soon, though the prospects remain uncertain. The Lufthansa Group’s low-cost carrier Eurowings said Monday it was expanding its summer vacation flights starting from June by adding 40 destinations including Spain’s Mallorca, Split in Croatia and the Greek island of Santorini. The airline warned that customers should check the status of local restrictions. It offered free rebooking up until 14 days before departure, including changing destination on flights within Europe.<br/>
The number of domestic air travelers hit a record low in more than two decades in April due to the coronavirus impact on the airline industry, industry data showed Tuesday. The number of passengers on the domestic routes plunged to 1.35 million last month, down 22 percent from 1.74 million a month earlier, according to Air Portal, an aviation data provider operated by the Korea Civil Aviation Association (KCA). The April figure marked the lowest level since January 1997. It is also sharply down from 10.63 million passengers on the domestic routes in January, the data showed. Local airlines have suspended most of their flights on international routes since March as an increasing number of countries have closed their borders or have taken other measures related to incoming passengers due to concerns over the coronavirus pandemic. <br/>
A new age of air travel is taking shape. Airports and airlines are rolling out temperature checks for crew and, increasingly, passengers, as well as thermal scans to spot people with elevated body temperatures. Face masks are now de rigueur for travelers across the US. Passengers on Europe’s biggest budget carrier must raise their hands to use the toilet. Forget about the perks of priority boarding at Air France. The carrier is one of several boarding passengers seated at the back of the aircraft first, to limit traffic jams in the aisle. Many airlines are removing in-flight magazines, scrapping meal services on shorter routes, and parking the duty-free cart. Getting off the plane at the end of the flight could take even longer than usual as airlines try to control the typical crush, with some saying flight attendants will cue small groups when it’s their turn to stand up. As lockdowns loosen, airlines are plotting a path out of hibernation, reformulating routes and services, and balancing safety protocols with the challenge of convincing passengers to board the enclosed space of an aircraft in the midst of a pandemic. Some of the biggest changes airlines envision are the result of what executives expect will be months, maybe years, of lower demand: They see fewer direct flights, for instance, which means more dreaded stopovers. Some airlines are considering requiring passengers to sign health certifications, or to eventually carry “immunity passports”—documentation that a passenger has had, and recovered from, the virus.<br/>
No passenger carrier on the planet can escape the painful shrinkage that Covid-19 is imposing on the aviation industry. For scrappy low-cost carriers, though, there is also something to like in a leaner market. Ryanair said Monday that it will lose E200m during its first fiscal quarter, which spans April to June. Through most of the crisis so far, shares of best-in-class budget carriers Southwest and Ryanair have outperformed those of full-service peers Delta and British Airways owner IAG. One reason is cyclical: Short-haul bookings are likely to return at a faster pace than international ones. Yet there are also longer-term advantages no-frills airlines can grasp in the crisis, especially in Europe. Before Covid-19 hit, Ryanair was undoubtedly the most successful airline in Europe, but costs were rising and its way forward was cloudy. The company had mostly exploited the benefits of nimble point-to-point routes between secondary airports with little competition, forcing it to take on cutthroat markets such as Germany with the 2018 purchase of Austrian startup Lauda. This deal also gave Ryanair some Airbus A320 jets, even though a Boeing 737-only fleet had long been key to keeping its maintenance and training costs low.<br/>