Ticket sales for indirect chartered flights between Shanghai and Taipei during the Lunar New Year holiday are reported to have significantly increased in the past few days, airline sources said yesterday.
Ticket sales were slow at the beginning, but the business has improved in recent days, airlines sources said, adding that about 80 percent of seats on nearly all flights have been sold so far.
Mandarin Airlines, which will use a 160-seat B737-800 plane for its charter, said 80 percent of the seats have been booked.
EVA Airways said it will use a 380-seat B747-400 jetliner for the flight and 300 seats have been booked.
UNI Airways will use a 140-seat MD-90 plane and said 107 seats have been sold and Trans Asia Airways said 120 seats on its flight have been booked.
China Airlines and Far East Air Transport said they have yet to make final tallies. The two airlines are still accepting reservations and said ticket sales have increased steadily in the past few days.
Reservations for the Shanghai-Taipei chartered flights were originally scheduled to close yesterday. But EVA Airways and UNI Airways said they will continue accepting registrations until Jan. 26.
Far East Air Transport will operate three round-trip flights during the Lunar New Year period while the other five carriers will provide just one round-trip flight each.
China Airlines will take the lead in kicking off the special service on Jan. 26.
It will dispatch two teams of pilots and co-pilots for the flight between Taipei and Shanghai. Its plane will take off from CKS International Airport at midnight with no passengers aboard and is scheduled to arrive at Shanghai's Pudong Airport at 9am on Jan. 26. The plane will depart from Shanghai two hours later on its return flight with a brief stop in Hong Kong.
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