Taiwan's UNI Airways (立榮) and Far Eastern Air Transport Corp (遠東) have seen all their flights to Bali depart empty, after tour group bookings skidded to a halt Tuesday, company officials said yesterday.
"Since Tuesday there hasn't been a single passenger on our flights to Bali," said Lai Wei-lung (賴威龍), an senior official at UNI Airways.
PHOTO: REUTERS
On Monday, travel authorities decided to cancel all group tours to Bali after the Ministry of Foreign Affairs classified Bali as a dangerous place and urged Taiwanese to avoid traveling there.
Lai said UNI would continue to ply the route to fly passengers in Bali back to Taiwan. UNI Airways operates four charter flights between Kaohsiung and Bali per week.
"However, we may cancel or reduce our flights after everyone returns to Taiwan," he said.
Far Eastern Air, which offers two Kaohsiung-Bali charter flights per week, has decided to stop its services for about 45 days.
"Between Oct. 20 and Dec. 5, Far Eastern Air will temporarily suspend its Bali route services," said Chen Yun-chuan (陳韻全), a public relations official at the company.
"We hope the tourism business in Bali will return to normal before Christmas. However, the company may shorten or extend the stoppage depending on the market situation," she said.
China Airlines Co (CAL, 華航) and EVA Airways Corp (長榮航空), which offer daily service between Taipei and Bali, are also reconsidering their flight schedules.
"Starting from Oct 19, EVA will cut its daily Taipei-Bali flights to three or four per week," EVA said in a statement yesterday.
EVA reported a 10 percent passenger load yesterday, a significant slide from 90 percent last week.
But China Airlines plans to keep its planes in the air.
"We currently don't plan to cut flight numbers, but we may reduce the size of plane used," said CAL spokesman Joseph Wu (
CAL may replace the 265-seat Airbus 300-600R it uses on the route with the 150-seat Boeing 737-800.
Over the past two days, fewer than 60 passengers have flown CAL flights to Bali, an occupation rate of about 22 percent.
Meanwhile, a travel industry veteran said yesterday that travel agencies specializing in Bali tours may be forced to go out of business.
"I estimate that more than 20 Taiwanese travel agencies who depend on Bali tourism will be forced to close because of the incident," said Tseng Sheng-hai (曾盛海), chairman of the Taipei Association of Travel Agents.
"The travel industry is going from bad to worse," Tseng said.
"We've suffered from last year's Sept. 11 attacks and now, because of the Bali incident, the public's confidence will definitely be impacted again," he said.
Vice President of Ten-Hai Travel Services Co (
"We hope the turbulence in Bali will ease up as soon as possible so our business can go back to normal," Yu said.
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